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There is a wide variety of free statistical software.  Some of it is from governmental or NGO organizations, such as Epi Info<ref>Epi Info, CDC, 2008 http://www.cdc.gov/epiinfo/index.htm.</ref>, from CDC, and IDAMS<ref>IDAMS Statistical Software, http://portal.unesco.org/ci/en/ev.php-URL_ID=2070&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html</ref> from UNESCO.  Some other software is from smaller or independent organizations or universities, such as Instat<ref>Instat - an interactive statistical package, Statistical Services Centre - University of Reading, 2009. http://www.ssc.rdg.ac.uk/software/instat/instat.html</ref> or Irristat<ref>Irristat, International Rice Research Instititue, Biometrics and Bioinformatics Unit,  http://www.irri.org/science/software/irristat.asp</ref>.  The great majority of free statistical software, however, is from individuals.  Some of the most commonly used software from individuals include Easyreg<ref>Easy Reg International, Herman Bierens, Penn State University, 2008 http://econ.la.psu.edu/~hbierens/EASYREG.HTM</ref>, MicrOsiris<ref>MicOsiris, Neal Van Eck, Van Eck Computer Consulting http://www.microsiris.com/</ref>,  OpenStat<ref>OpenStat, Bill Miller, 2009 http://www.statpages.org/miller/openstat/</ref>, and Zelig<ref>Zelig, Kosuke Imai, Gary King and Olivia Lau , 2009 http://gking.harvard.edu/zelig/</ref>.
==Introduction==
 
There is a wide variety of free statistical software from a variety of sources, including governments, NGSs, universities, and developed by individuals.  Most of it is fairly easy to learn, using menu systems, while a few are command driven.  Many of these free software packages have been used in academic research in peer reviewed journals or in publications from major organizations.  Some are very popular while others are much less frequently used.  In general, though, free statistical software should be seen as a reasonable alternative to the commercial packages.
 
===Sources of free statistical software===
 
Some of the free software is from governmental or NGO organizations, such as Epi Info<ref>Epi Info, CDC, 2008 http://www.cdc.gov/epiinfo/index.htm.</ref>, from CDC, and IDAMS<ref>IDAMS Statistical Software, http://portal.unesco.org/ci/en/ev.php-URL_ID=2070&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html</ref> from UNESCO.  Some other software is from smaller or independent organizations or universities, such as Instat<ref>Instat - an interactive statistical package, Statistical Services Centre - University of Reading, 2009. http://www.ssc.rdg.ac.uk/software/instat/instat.html</ref> or Irristat<ref>Irristat, International Rice Research Instititue, Biometrics and Bioinformatics Unit,  http://www.irri.org/science/software/irristat.asp</ref>.  The great majority of free statistical software, however, is from individuals.  Some of the most commonly used software from individuals include Easyreg<ref>Easy Reg International, Herman Bierens, Penn State University, 2008 http://econ.la.psu.edu/~hbierens/EASYREG.HTM</ref>, MicrOsiris<ref>MicOsiris, Neal Van Eck, Van Eck Computer Consulting http://www.microsiris.com/</ref>,  OpenStat<ref>OpenStat, Bill Miller, 2009 http://www.statpages.org/miller/openstat/</ref>, and Zelig<ref>Zelig, Kosuke Imai, Gary King and Olivia Lau , 2009 http://gking.harvard.edu/zelig/</ref>.


Two other packages should be mentioned.  These are being developed by groups, rather than individuals, but not by established institutions, like universities, governments, or NGOs. Rather these are groups of individuals. PSPP<ref>PSPP, 2008 http://www.gnu.org/software/pspp/</ref>, from the GNU project, is developing into a clone of SPSS, but is free. The R project<ref>The R Project, http://cran.r-project.org/</ref> is also frequently used.
Two other packages should be mentioned.  These are being developed by groups, rather than individuals, but not by established institutions, like universities, governments, or NGOs. Rather these are groups of individuals. PSPP<ref>PSPP, 2008 http://www.gnu.org/software/pspp/</ref>, from the GNU project, is developing into a clone of SPSS, but is free. The R project<ref>The R Project, http://cran.r-project.org/</ref> is also frequently used.

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Introduction

There is a wide variety of free statistical software from a variety of sources, including governments, NGSs, universities, and developed by individuals. Most of it is fairly easy to learn, using menu systems, while a few are command driven. Many of these free software packages have been used in academic research in peer reviewed journals or in publications from major organizations. Some are very popular while others are much less frequently used. In general, though, free statistical software should be seen as a reasonable alternative to the commercial packages.

Sources of free statistical software

Some of the free software is from governmental or NGO organizations, such as Epi Info[1], from CDC, and IDAMS[2] from UNESCO. Some other software is from smaller or independent organizations or universities, such as Instat[3] or Irristat[4]. The great majority of free statistical software, however, is from individuals. Some of the most commonly used software from individuals include Easyreg[5], MicrOsiris[6], OpenStat[7], and Zelig[8].

Two other packages should be mentioned. These are being developed by groups, rather than individuals, but not by established institutions, like universities, governments, or NGOs. Rather these are groups of individuals. PSPP[9], from the GNU project, is developing into a clone of SPSS, but is free. The R project[10] is also frequently used.

Most of these packages are menu driven, and can be learned a couple of hours at most, except R, which is generally code driven and probably requires a much longer time to learn.

There is also a journal specifically for statistical software[11], although the main focus is on commercial software, R and some coding snippets.

There are a few reviews of free statistical software. There were two reviews in journals, one by Zhu and Kuljaca[12] and another article that included mainly a brief review of R[13]. A couple of websites that list software also have very brief reviews of each package. The two sites that have these are by StatCon[14] and by Pezzullo[15].

In order to use any statistical software appropriately, it is generally a good idea to have a good background in Statistics.

References

  1. ↑ Epi Info, CDC, 2008 http://www.cdc.gov/epiinfo/index.htm.
  2. ↑ IDAMS Statistical Software, http://portal.unesco.org/ci/en/ev.php-URL_ID=2070&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html
  3. ↑ Instat - an interactive statistical package, Statistical Services Centre - University of Reading, 2009. http://www.ssc.rdg.ac.uk/software/instat/instat.html
  4. ↑ Irristat, International Rice Research Instititue, Biometrics and Bioinformatics Unit, http://www.irri.org/science/software/irristat.asp
  5. ↑ Easy Reg International, Herman Bierens, Penn State University, 2008 http://econ.la.psu.edu/~hbierens/EASYREG.HTM
  6. ↑ MicOsiris, Neal Van Eck, Van Eck Computer Consulting http://www.microsiris.com/
  7. ↑ OpenStat, Bill Miller, 2009 http://www.statpages.org/miller/openstat/
  8. ↑ Zelig, Kosuke Imai, Gary King and Olivia Lau , 2009 http://gking.harvard.edu/zelig/
  9. ↑ PSPP, 2008 http://www.gnu.org/software/pspp/
  10. ↑ The R Project, http://cran.r-project.org/
  11. ↑ Journal of Statistical Software, http://www.jstatsoft.org/
  12. ↑ "A Short Preview of Free Statistical Software Packages for Teaching Statistics to Industrial Technology Majors" Journal of Industrial Technology (Volume 21-2, April 2005), Ms. Xiaoping Zhu and Dr. Ognjen Kuljaca. http://www.nait.org/jit/current.html
  13. ↑ Felix Grant, "Free Statistics Software, Yours, Free to keep....", Scientific Computing World, Sept/Oct 2004, http://www.scientific-computing.com/scwsepoct04free_statistics.html
  14. ↑ List of free statistical software, Open Source & Public Domain Packages with Source Code. StatCon 2006. http://statistiksoftware.com/free_software.html
  15. ↑ Pezzullo, Free Statistical Software, 2009. http://statpages.org/javasta2.html
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