Spark for Data Science

Introduction to machine learning

In the previous sections of the book, we learnt how the response/outcome variable is related to the predictor variables, typically in a supervised learning context. There are various different names for both of those types of variables that people use these days. Let us see some of the synonymous terms for them and we will use them interchangeably in the book:

• Input variables (X): Features, predictors, explanatory variables, independent variables
• Output variables (Y): Response variable, dependent variable

If there is a relation between Y and X where X=X₁, X₂, X₃,..., X_n (n different predictors) then it can be written as follows:

Here is a function that represents how X describes Y and is unknown! This is what we ...