RapidMiner

RapidMiner
Developer(s) RapidMiner
Initial release 2006
Stable release 6.1 / 8 October 2014
Operating system Cross-platform
Type Statistical analysis, data mining, predictive analytics
License AGPL/Proprietary
Website rapidminer.com

RapidMiner is a software platform developed by the company of the same name that provides an integrated environment for machine learning, data mining, text mining, predictive analytics and business analytics. It is used for business and industrial applications as well as for research, education, training, rapid prototyping, and application development and supports all steps of the data mining process including results visualization, validation and optimization.[1] RapidMiner is developed on a business source model which means the core and earlier versions of the software are available under an OSI-certified open source license on Sourceforge.[2] A Starter Edition is available for free download, a Personal Edition is offered for US$999, a Professional Edition is $2,999 and pricing for the Enterprise Edition is available from the developer.[3]

History

RapidMiner, formerly known as YALE (Yet Another Learning Environment), was developed starting in 2001 by Ralf Klinkenberg, Ingo Mierswa, and Simon Fischer at the Artificial Intelligence Unit of the Technical University of Dortmund.[4] Starting in 2006, its development was driven by Rapid-I, a company founded by Ingo Mierswa and Ralf Klinkenberg in the same year.[5] In 2007, the name of the software was changed from YALE to RapidMiner and the company Rapid-I GmbH was incorporated.[6]

Description

RapidMiner uses a client/server model with the server offered as Software as a Service or on cloud infrastructures.[7]

According to Bloor Research, RapidMiner provides 99% of an advanced analytical solution through template-based frameworks that speed delivery and reduce errors by nearly eliminating the need to write code. RapidMiner provides data mining and machine learning procedures including: data loading and transformation (Extract, transform, load (ETL)), data preprocessing and visualization, predictive analytics and statistical modeling, evaluation, and deployment. RapidMiner is written in the Java programming language. RapidMiner provides a GUI to design and execute analytical workflows. Those workflows are called “Process” in RapidMiner and they consist of multiple “Operators”. Each operator is performing a single task within the process and the output of each operator forms the input of the next one. Alternatively, the engine can be called from other programs or used as an API. Individual functions can be called from the command line. RapidMiner provides learning schemes and models and algorithms from Weka and R scripts that can be used through extensions.[8]

RapidMiner functionality can be extended with additional plugins. The Rapid Miner Extensions marketplace provides a platform for developers to create data analysis algorithms and publish them to the community.[9] RapidMiner is distributed under the AGPL open source license and has been hosted by SourceForge where it is rated the #1 business analytics software. Commercial licenses and hosting are offered by RapidMiner.[10]

With version 6.0, RapidMiner started to offer new application wizards addressed to business analysts needs for predictive analytics.[11]

Adoption

In 2014, Gartner Research placed RapidMiner in the leader quadrant of its Magic Quadrant for Advanced Analytics. The report described RapidMiner's strengths as a "platform that supports an extensive breadth and depth of functionality, and with that it comes quite close to the market Leaders."[12] In the 2014 and 2013 annual software poll KDnuggets ranked RapidMiner the most popular data analytics software with the poll’s respondents citing the software package as the tool they use.[13][14] RapidMiner received one of the strongest satisfaction ratings in the 2011 Rexer Analytics Data Miner Survey.[15] RapidMiner has received over 3 million total downloads and has over 200,000 users including eBay, Intel, PepsiCo and Kraft Foods as paying customers. RapidMiner claims to be the market leader in the software for predictive data analytics services against competitors such as Revolution Analytics, SAS, Predixion Software, SQL Server, StatSoft and IBM.[16]

Developer

About 50 developers worldwide participate in the development of the open source RapidMiner with the majority of the contributors being employees of RapidMiner.[17] The company that develops RapidMiner software recently changed its name from Rapid-I to RapidMiner and received a $5 million series A funding with participation from European venture capital firms Earlybird Venture Capital and Open Ocean Capital. The company stated that the funding will be used to build out the development and marketing teams.[18] Open Ocean partner Michael "Monty" Widenius is a founder of MySQL.

References

  1. ↑ Markus Hofmann, Ralf Klinkenberg, “RapidMiner: Data Mining Use Cases and Business Analytics Applications (Chapman & Hall/CRC Data Mining and Knowledge Discovery Series),” CRC Press, October 25, 2013.
  2. ↑ "The core of RapidMiner is open source". RapidMiner. Retrieved 18 July 2014.
  3. ↑ RapidMiner 6 Review, Butler Analytics, November 22, 2013.
  4. ↑ Guido Deutsch, “RapidMiner from Rapid-I at CeBIT 2010,” Data Mining Blog, March 18, 2010.
  5. ↑ “Interview with RapidMiner's Ingo Mierswa, Ralf Klinkenberg”, KDnuggets, February, 2010.
  6. ↑ “Free Data Mining Software: RapidMiner 4.0 (formerly YALE)”, KDNuggets, August 7, 2007.
  7. ↑ David Norris, “RapidMiner - a potential game changer,” IT-Director.com, November 22, 2013.
  8. ↑ David Norris, “RapidMiner - a potential game changer,” Bloor Research, November 13, 2013.
  9. ↑ Ajay Ohri, “Interview with Rapid-I Ingo Mierswa and Simon Fischer,” KDnuggets, August 2011.
  10. ↑ “RapidMiner,” Sourceforget.net.
  11. ↑ RapidMiner 6 Review, Butler Analytics, November 22, 2013.
  12. ↑ "RapidMiner: Leader in Gartner Research Magic Quadrant for Advanced Analytics Platforms," Garnter, February 24, 2014.
  13. ↑ “KDnuggets Annual Software Poll:RapidMiner and R vie for first place,” KDnuggets, June 2013.
  14. ↑ “KDnuggets 15th Annual Software Poll:RapidMiner continues to lead.,” KDnuggets, June 2014.
  15. ↑ “2011 Data Miner Survey,” Rexer Analytics.
  16. ↑ Ingrid Lunden, “German Predictive Analytics Startup Rapid-I Rebrands As RapidMiner, Takes $5M From Open Ocean, Earlybird To Tackle The U.S. Market,” TechCrunch, November 4, 2013.
  17. ↑ Evan Quinn, “Is Rapid-I the Hidden Giant of Analytics?,” QuinnSight Research, June 17, 2013.
  18. ↑ Andrew Brust, “Rapid-I gets funded, re-brands as RapidMiner,” ZDNet, November 4, 2013.

External links