This category groups articles that are oriented on the topic of Decision Trees. Each post focuses on specific aspects, or attributes, of Decision Trees. The emphasis here is on gaining a deep intuition for how Decision Trees work. Worked examples in Python are provided.
Can Decision Trees Handle Missing Values? Yes, Decision Trees handle missing values naturally. It is straightforward to extend the CART algorithm to support the handling of missing values. However, attention needs to be made regarding how the algorithm is implemented in code. In this post, I will implement classification and regression Decision Trees capable of dealing …
Are Decision Trees Robust to Outliers? In general, Decision Trees are quite robust to the presence of outliers in the data. This is true for both training and prediction. However, care needs to be taken to ensure the Decision Tree has been adequately regularised. An overfitted Decision Tree will show sensitivity to outliers. Why are …
How to Interpret Decision Trees with 1 Simple Example We can interpret Decision Trees as a sequence of simple questions for our data, with yes/no answers. One starts at the root node, where the first question is asked. Based upon the answer, we navigate to one of two child nodes. Each child node asks an additional …
How to Interpret Decision Trees with 1 Simple Example Read More »
3 Methods to Tune Hyperparameters in Decision Trees We can tune hyperparameters in Decision Trees by comparing models trained with different parameter configurations, on the same data. An optimal model can then be selected from the various different attempts, using any relevant metrics. There are several different techniques for accomplishing this task. Three of the …
3 Methods to Tune Hyperparameters in Decision Trees Read More »
How to Measure Information Gain in Decision Trees For classification problems, information gain in Decision Trees is measured using the Shannon Entropy. The amount of entropy can be calculated for any given node in the tree, along with its two child nodes. The difference between the amount of entropy in the parent node, and the …
How to Measure Information Gain in Decision Trees Read More »
Explaining the Gini Impurity with Examples in Python This article will cover the Gini Impurity: what it is and how it is used. To make this discussion more concrete, we will then work through the implementation, and use, of the Gini Impurity in Python. What is the Gini Impurity? The Gini Impurity is a loss …
Explaining the Gini Impurity with Examples in Python Read More »
Build a Decision Tree in Python from Scratch In this post, we will build a CART Decision Tree model in Python from scratch. We will start with the foundational principals, and work straight through to implementation in code. Both classification and regression examples will be included. Motivation to Build a Decision Tree Model Decision Trees are …