Data Mining?

n_wattam

was wondering if anyone can confirm if the following can be or is, classed as data mining...

i made a scrip that collects weather information every 20mins, for all the metar stations around the world. Every time the check is done, any new forcasts found are replaced for the old existing ones.

This is all done within my own database, so i dont have to keep running queries on the orginal data source, which would create more load for the provider.

I then take what is current data and use it to plot the weather in a graphical form on a map of the UK or any other country i wish too.

here is a link for a better idea.

I want to use this as a project in a portfolio site i am in the middle of doing and dont want to use terms which are incorrect.

bpat1434

It is if you don't get permission from the original websites... of course if they have XML feeds you can use, then no. Depends on how you're getting the information.

bubblenut

When it comes to technical definitions I always find Wikipedia very useful. Check out their article on Data Mining. I think the important thing to pick up here can be seen from the following quote. "The nontrivial extraction of implicit, previously unknown, and potentially useful information from data"
Firstly, the data you've extracted isn't really implicit (implied) it's explicit, ie, you are using the data itself as it is rather than infering information from the data. Secondly (and very closely related) is the fact that the data you are using is not previously unknown, you are just presenting it differently. Because of this I would say that what you're doing isn't really data mining, it's merely presenting data in another format. Don't get me wrong, I think it's very cool and you've pulled it off brilliantly. I can't think of a cool, marketing friendly way of describing it right now, I'll have a think though 😉

n_wattam

Hi, thanks for your posts guys.

Think i have to agree, it doesnt seem to fit in the definition does it... wasnt sure my self and didnt want to look a fool, if i was questioned about it :p ..

Yeah if you can think of any other discriptions of the mothods i have used that would be great.

pohopo

It could be considered data mining if when you grab the data you don't just display it, but you find trends in it like how much does the temperature fluctuate, was the temperature higher then normal for that time or day, and so on. If all you do is pull then display the data I would not call it data mining.

Weedpacket

I remember the story of the advertising company that obtained data on residential sewage flows from a city wastewater treatment plant. Correlated that with TV programming schedules (after helping to sponsor a recent major film on the night in question).

Idea was to find out which ad breaks people were sitting through.

Now that's data mining. A dirty job but I guess someone will pay to have it done.

pohopo

Weedpacket wrote:
I remember the story of the advertising company that obtained data on residential sewage flows from a city wastewater treatment plant. Correlated that with TV programming schedules (after helping to sponsor a recent major film on the night in question).

Idea was to find out which ad breaks people were sitting through.

Now that's data mining. A dirty job but I guess someone will pay to have it done.

That is funny, but very smart.