Contents

• Analytic Facilities
• Unique Features
• A General Philosophy of the STATISTICA Approach
• Software Technology
• Web Enablement
• Speed
• Precision
• Record of Recognition

STATISTICA is a comprehensive, integrated data analysis, graphics, database management, and custom application development system featuring a wide selection of basic and advanced analytic procedures for business, data mining, science, and engineering applications.

STATISTICA includes not only general purpose statistical, graphical, and analytic data management procedures, but also comprehensive implementations of specialized methods for data analysis (e.g., data mining, business, social sciences, biomedical research, or engineering applications). All analytic tools offered in the STATISTICA line of software are available to you as part of an integrated package. These tools can be controlled through a selection of alternative user interfaces and a comprehensive, industry standard (Visual Basic-based) programming language. Interactive user interfaces can be easily customized and the language (STATISTICA Visual Basic) can be used to automate tasks of any complexity, from simple macros recorded to automate a routine operation, to advanced, large scale development projects (e.g., custom analytic extensions that integrate STATISTICA with other applications or with large, enterprise-wide, Internet or Intranet-wide computing environments).

Some of the unique features of the STATISTICA line of software include:

• the breadth of selection and comprehensiveness of implementation of analytical procedures,
• the unparalleled selection, quality, and customizability of graphics integrated seamlessly with every computational procedure,
• a wide selection of advanced software technologies (see Software Technology) that are responsible for STATISTICA's practically unlimited capacity, performance (speed, responsiveness), and application customization options,
• the efficient and user-friendly user interface, and
• the fully integrated, industry standard STATISTICA Visual Basic that adds more than 11,000 new functions to the comprehensive syntax of Microsoft Visual Basic, thus comprising one of the most extensive development environments available.

One of the most unique and important features of the STATISTICA family of applications is that these technologies allow even inexperienced users to tailor STATISTICA to their specific preferences. You can customize practically every aspect of STATISTICA, including even the low-level procedures of its user interface. The same version of STATISTICA can be used:

• By novices to perform routine tasks using the default (e.g., Quick) analysis startup dialogs (containing just a few, self-explanatory buttons), or even by accessing STATISTICA with their Web browsers (and a highly simplified "front end"), and
• By experienced analysts, professional statisticians, and advanced application developers who can integrate any of STATISTICA's highly optimized procedures (more than 11,000 functions) into custom applications or computing environments, using any of the cutting edge, object-oriented, and/or Web-embedded software technologies.

Click here to read more about STATISTICA's unique features.

STATISTICA's default configuration (its general user interface and system options) is a result of years of listening carefully to our users. We have received feedback from tens of thousands of our users, representing hundreds of thousands of users from all continents and, practically speaking, all walks of life. One of the most important facts that we learned from these users is how different their needs and preferences are (both across individuals and projects or applications). In order to meet those differentiated needs, STATISTICA is designed to offer perhaps one of the most flexible and easily customizable user interfaces of any contemporary application.

Although STATISTICA provides access to a powerful arsenal of advanced software technologies (see Software Technology), you do not even need to know about them because they are designed to work automatically and intuitively. A novice user may never see more than a few self-explanatory buttons. Advanced options, however, are only one tab or mouse click away. Practically every aspect of STATISTICA (from the startup configuration, to the way the output is generated and managed by the system, to how STATISTICA prompts you to choose your next step) can be changed with a mouse click. Moreover, STATISTICA remembers your changes until you change your mind. Practically every dialog used to select an analysis or perform a routine operation can be easily replaced (e.g., simplified, enhanced, or combined with custom, user-designed procedures). STATISTICA will always look and work the way you want.

The performance, flexible customizability, and the wide selection of options that can be tailored to your needs mentioned in the previous section would not be possible if STATISTICA did not feature the advanced technologies that drive all functions of the application.

Multithreading and distributed processing architecture delivers unmatched performance (offered in the Client-Server version) including super-computer-like parallel processing technology that optionally scales to multiple server computers that can work in parallel to rapidly process computationally intensive projects.

STATISTICA uses and/or supports virtually all the relevant leading edge software technologies available today. Every one of the thousands of STATISTICA features is accessible from the object model, and each can be accessed transparently for selective or global integration with other applications (e.g., using Visual Basic, C++, or Java). STATISTICA incorporates advanced implementations of the OLE/ActiveX technology in client and server mode for all document types; practically no limitations are imposed in terms of either the amount or complexity of data that can be stored. STATISTICA also is optimized for Web and multimedia applications. Computational and graphics procedures are driven by countless proprietary optimizations (such as, for example, the "quadruple precision" computational technology that allows us to overcome the limitations of the IEEE floating point storage standards). As a result, STATISTICA offers unmatched speed, numerical precision, and responsiveness, which is aided by multithreading. Data access is based on a flexible streaming technology that allows STATISTICA to work effortlessly with both the simple input datafiles stored on the local drive and queries of multidimensional databases containing terabytes of data and stored in remote data warehouses, and processed in-place (see IDP) (i.e., without having to import them to a local storage; this feature is available in enterprise versions of STATISTICA).

For example, you can simultaneously run multiple instances of STATISTICA, each running multiple analyses of data from multiple and simultaneously open input datafiles and queries, and the results can be organized into separate projects. STATISTICA's input and output datafiles and graphs can be of practically unlimited size, comprising hierarchies of documents of various types. The output can be directed to a multitude of output channels such as high performance workbooks, reports, the Internet, etc.

Web-enablement offered in all STATISTICA products. The output from all STATISTICA products is Web enabled (in a way that some other software manufacturers call - technically incorrectly - "a full or complete Web-enablement"). Specifically, you can automatically direct formatted reports with presentation-quality tables and graphs to Web servers. Users can easily record macros to perform a set of specific analyses and automatically deliver results in a variety of ways. Results can be automatically posted on the Internet or Intranet or e-mailed to specific recipients as HTML reports that can be viewed with a browser. With practically no programming skills users can set macros to run repeatedly - at specific intervals or whenever new data are found in a database. Again, STATISTICA can automatically post updated results.

WebSTATISTICA Server The addition of WebSTATISTICA Server adds a new dimension and an endless array of new possibilities because it makes the entire operation of STATISTICA truly Web-based:

1. First of all, users can now run STATISTICA using only a Web browser - from virtually any computer in the world as long as it is connected to the Internet. They can interactively access data sets on the corporate network or the Internet, run queries, and interactively perform analyses on those data and create reports that can be reviewed interactively in the same browser on the client computer, posted on the Internet, or shared only with those who have specific access privileges.

2. Because of its distributed processing architecture, WebSTATISTICA Server scales in a highly efficient manner to take advantage of multi-processor CPU's and/or multiple server computers, and therefore users can take full advantage of its designated multi-tier Client-Server architecture. WebSTATISTICA Server can be used as the ultimate enterprise data analysis system, where users can:

(a) work collaboratively with others - in the same building or on a different continent - by sharing queries, scripts of analyses, reports, or other documents,

(b) take advantage of the centrally managed projects controlled via designated system of specific access privileges, and

(c) those who have STATISTICA installed on their client machines can offload computationally intensive tasks to the - usually most powerful (multiprocessor) - server computers, and, for example, run "in the background" queries that will scan terabytes of data on remote servers and perform time consuming long sequences of analyses or reports, while keeping computers of the end-users completely free to do other tasks.

STATISTICA features optimizations that improve upon the analysis speeds of previous version (STATISTICA 5) which was one of the fastest applications available on the market. These optimizations are especially useful when accessing enterprise databases and analyzing large amounts of information (see Comparative performance benchmarks using large data sets). Computational and graphics procedures in STATISTICA are driven by countless proprietary optimizations. As a result, STATISTICA offers unmatched speed, numerical precision, and responsiveness, which is aided by multithreading. Data access is based on a flexible streaming technology that allows STATISTICA to work effortlessly with both the simple input datafiles stored on the local drive and queries of multidimensional databases containing terabytes of data and stored in remote data warehouses, and processed asynchronously in-place (see IDP) (i.e., without having to import them to a local storage; this feature is available in enterprise versions of STATISTICA).

STATISTICA features a unique system of numerical optimizations and highly-optimized memory management which are largely responsible for the unmatched speed of the program. It also includes a proprietary screen redraw and region selection system which refreshes, redraws, and highlights complex sets of graphical objects at speeds limited only by the computer hardware (and the drivers), additionally contributing to the program's overall responsiveness. The advanced multithreading technology implemented in STATISTICA additionally contributes to the program responsiveness (e.g., complex graphs and graphical displays redraw in separate threads "in the background" allowing you to continue your interactive work). The Client-Server version features advanced multithreading and distributed processing technology that scales flexibly to multiple CPUs in one computer or several interconnected server computers.

For example, consider the representative, demanding benchmark of numerical precision (shown below). In this sample dataset, variable var2 (which features a small relative variance) is a linear function of var3; thus, the correlation coefficient between any variable (e.g., variable var1) and var2 should be identical to the correlation between that variable and var3.

Here are the two correlation coefficients (var1*var2 and var1*var3) calculated by STATISTICA (using its extended precision optimization algorithm), and displayed with the highest precision available.

We invite you to perform this test of numerical precision on any other numerical application program. For other validation benchmarks and more information regarding the validation of computational algorithms, please refer to the Validation Benchmarks topic reporting results of 52 demanding tests of numerical precision and statistical accuracy.

Record of Recognition

We are pleased to report that, as of this release, STATISTICA has received the highest rating in every published, independent comparative review in which it was featured. In the history of the software industry, very few products have ever achieved such a record. Click here for more information about STATISTICA's record of recognition.

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