Classroom goodness of fit testing using Microsoft Windows

Abstract

The author points out that the chi-square goodness-of-fit test and other statistical tests for comparing observed data with a theoretical distribution are not well supported by the popular statistical analysis packages such as SAS, SPSS, BMDP, and MINITAB. To overcome this limitation, he has written a PC-based program to support goodness-of-fit testing and has used it in his simulation class. The original version of this program was written as a typical, menu-oriented DOS application using the language True BASIC. This program was rewritten in the language C to run under the Microsoft Windows 3.0 operating environment. The author discusses the importance of goodness-to-fit testing in simulation and other stochastic modeling classes, describes the Windows 3.0 version of this program and its limitations, and discusses how this program can be used in a simulation class.<>