[SciPy-user] normalizing data/distributions

[Scott Bray]

Hey everyone,

i am working on a statistics type project for university study. i have a set 
of data, have built a discrete probability distribution from this data 
(using the cauchy distribution) and now want to normalize it. currently, the 
area of the distribution is not equal to one. i have been trying to find 
literature about how to normalize, but have been unsuccessful (and what i 
have found, i am unsure on the validity). some say to normalize the data 
points by:

(data point - sample mean) / sample std

others say to multiply by a normalising constant that is "chosen" to make 
the area equal to one. i tried this by just scaling the area to equal one.

i'm sorry if this is unclear, but if you have done this sort of thing 
before, i would REALLY appreciate some help. just ask me some questions if 
needs be.

Thanks
Scott

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