Quantified Self: An Introduction to Analyzing the Data about You, in Python - Section B

It is now commonplace to know that we are tracked in almost every activity and sphere of our life, and as technology gets increasingly more embedded into our lives — with wearables and the rise of the Internet of Things — more and more streams of data about us continue to be created. Whether it is your step count, your sleeping schedule, the locations you've traveled to, the people you've met, the messages you've sent over email, Facebook, Slack and text messages, the website you've visited, the music and video you have streamed to, and so on. All this information is tracked, and can be visualized and analyzed to produce very interesting insights into your life.

Even without any existing coding literacy, you will get a better understanding of the ecosystem of services that are storing information about you, and the format this data is available in (text, time series, collection of images, etc.). You will be shown some techniques to extract some of the data from these services. Depending on your existing level of coding literacy (in Python or Java or another language), you will also be shown how to visualize the data, as well as be introduced to some advanced techniques for data collection. The goal is to look for insights in your life patterns, relationship, or whether you are meeting your professional goals. The workshop will have fully working templates in the cloud, in Python, which will allow even complete beginners with no prior experience to get a taste of coding, by filling the blanks in! The expected outcome of this evening workshop is to make the audience more curious and empowered while a bit less afraid, about the tremendous amounts of data being collected about them — and to show how these can be useful to them.

Meet the Facilitator: Jérémie Lumbroso, Ph.D., has been a faculty member at Princeton University's Department of Computer Science since 2014. During that time, he has taught multiple times in the two largest courses on campus COS 126 (An Interdisciplinary Introduction to Computer Science) and COS 226 (Algorithms and Data Structures), introducing thousands of students to programming, and for which he has won teaching awards. He fell in love with programming, computers and data when he was 2 years old, learned how to read/write for the specific purpose of programming at age 6, and has never looked back — and he cares deeply about any obstacle in the path of newcomers to programming, which he thinks should be accessible to all. The workshop he is proposing at Wintersession 2023 seeks to introduce newcomers not just to programming but to how beautiful and significant it can be to have data about yourself, when you are in control.

Workshop website: https://jlumbroso.github.io/wintersession2023/

What to Expect:
Evening Event

To request accommodations for this event, please contact the workshop or event facilitator at least 3 working days prior to the event.

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