Handling of mixed type datasets with categorical features

[candalfigomoro]

From the README file:

both categorical and continuous features are handled well

How do we handle categorical features? Is one-hot-encoding enough?

In UMAP you can use different distances for one-hot-encoded categorical features (e.g. dice, jaccard etc.) and continuous features, then you perform an "intersection" (see lmcinnes/umap#58).

How can we handle mixed type datasets in ivis? Can we just use it on a dataset with continuous features and one-hot-encoded categorical features mixed together?

Thank you very much

[idroz]

Hi - you can mix one-hot-encoded features with continuous. Since OHE will be 0/1, you may also need to scale your continuous features to 0-1 scale as well.

[candalfigomoro]

Thank you!