Finding Individual Records

In manchen Fällen geht es bei der Datenanalyse nicht um die Verdichtung. Es kann auch um das Auffinden bestimmter individueller Datensätze, wie Ausreißern und Sonderfällen gehen.

According to Jeffrey Leek and Roger Peng, data analysis only begins where data is aggregated or summarized (they themselves use the term summarized). This is also the first question we need to ask ourselves according to their flowchart.

This view is understandable from a scientific perspective. However, at least in business practice, there are also questions that do not require data summarization. This applies when it comes to finding individual data records within the overall dataset. This can involve looking up specific information, such as a customer's address. It can also be about finding a data record with a specific characteristic - for example, the customer with the highest turnover.

In my experience, such questions frequently arise in the business environment. Especially in day-to-day operations, this information is often urgently needed but cannot be determined due to a lack of suitable tools. In such situations, it is helpful to have people available who have knowledge of data analysis and languages like SQL.