Preface

This book provides an introduction to data science and offers a practical overview of the concepts and techniques that readers need to get the most out of their large-scale data mining projects and research studies. It discusses data-analytical thinking, which is essential to extract useful knowledge and obtain commercial value from the data. Also known as data-driven science, soft computing and data mining disciplines cover a broad interdisciplinary range of scientific methods and processes. The book provides readers with sufficient knowledge to tackle a wide range of issues in complex systems, bringing together the scopes that integrate soft computing and data mining in various combinations of applications and practices, since to thrive in these data-driven ecosystems, researchers, data analysts and practitioners must understand the design choice and options of these approaches. This book helps readers to solve complex benchmark problems and to better appreciate the concepts, tools and techniques used.