Data is everywhere, logging is cheap, and analysis is inevitable. One of the most fundamental concepts of this chapter is based on gathering useful data. After building a large collection of usable text, which we call the corpus, we must learn to represent this content in code. The primary focus will be first on obtaining data and later on enumerating ways of representing it.
Gathering data is arguably as important as analyzing it to extrapolate results and form valid generalizable claims. It is a scientific pursuit; therefore, great care must and will be taken to ensure unbiased and representative sampling. We recommend following along closely in this chapter because the remainder of the book depends on having a source of data to work with. Without data, there isn't much to analyze, so we should carefully observe the techniques laid out to build our own formidable corpus.
The first recipe enumerates various sources to start gathering data online. The next few recipes deal with using local data of different file formats. We then learn how to download data from the Internet using our Haskell code. Finally, we finish this chapter with a couple of recipes on using databases in Haskell.