Originally Posted by
Snoopy
There is a difference between a forum and a book publishing site!
The stuff I write on this site is the sort of stuff I formerly would have written on a dog eared bit of paper, then filed it away to relook at come next results time. These kind of notes are by their nature error prone, either in mathematics or judgement. Yet by filing these notes away and coming back to them later you can often get a better view of the 'big picture'. And sometimes, when posted here, fellow contributors can point these errors out, they can be corrected, and a better view of the big picture emerges.
There is an alternative. I could keep all my notes in my self constructed ivory tower. Pour over them with candles at midnight, until months later I publish my self congratulated 'magnum opus' result. At that point the errors are found and I come crashing down with my ziggurat, the spire of which promptly impails me through my rear end. I then limp off into the sunset never to seen or heard from again. Now I am sure there are some on this forum who would relish such a happening. Yes it would be entertaining. But it wouldn't help anyone understand Heartland any better!
Don't be too quick to dish the mistakes. One usually learns a lot more from one's mistakes than from one's correctness. It is the end result that matters. The path taken to get there has many divides and many dead end corners.
As for being long winded, the best analysis of any situation is to make it as simple as possible, but no simpler. I generally work by starting out with a few more complex ideas, different ways of measuring the things I deem that need measuring. Then I hone the procedures to make them simpler. Don't think analysing a bank can be reduced to rehashing a couple of quotes from the results presentation.
SNOOPY