{ "cells": [ { "cell_type": "markdown", "metadata": {}, "source": [ "# Classification\n", "\n", "Another general task in data analysis and machine learning is classification. \n", "\n", "Classification, in general, is the process of predicting the 'class' of datapoints, meaning to assign a label to the data point, or assign them to a grouping or cluster. \n", "\n", "Classification is a type of supervised learning, meaning we typically have some data for which we know the classes, and we want to learn a procedure that can use this information (the data with known labels), to learn a mapping from data to labels that we can apply to new data. \n", "\n", "Note that if we have data that we are trying to categorize, but don't already know any labels, we typically call this clustering. \n", "\n", "Classification can also be thought of as the categorical version of prediction. Prediction, as we've talked about it, is process of predicting a continuous output from a set of features. Classification is the same idea, except in case we are predicting a discrete category (or label). " ] }, { "cell_type": "markdown", "metadata": {}, "source": [ "