Hi,
 
I am trying to figure out how I can use ESS to keep a "diary" of my data
analysis. The ESS help discusses some usage scenarios under the
following heading 

 
<http://www.analytics.washington.edu/downloads/ess/doc/html/ess_toc.html
#TOC23> Scenarios for use (possibilities--based on actual usage)

1:  ##    Data Analysis Example (source code is real)

 
 
It suggest using of two files, the source file myfile.R and the
transcript file myfile.Rt. In short you are supposed to start with
myfile.R and then capture the results in the transcript myfile.Rt. But
it is not clear how to continue the analysis the next day when you have
both myfile.R and the transcript myfile.Rt. For example, do you save the
new session in a new transcript file myfile2.Rt or you append it to the
existing transcript, etc?
 
So here are some questions that I have:
Could someone please give at least a toy multi-session example of using
myfile.R and myfile.Rt?
Do I need the .R file if I don't write my own functions?
Is it a possible/advisable to run R in the .Rt buffer?
When I open .Rt file in Emacs the buffer comes out non-editable, why?
 
 
To narrow down the scope of my questions let me describe how I use R.
Normally I prepare one or more datasets using R or Perl scripts and then
I analyze the datasets in a number of interactive sessions interactively
in the *R* buffer. I rarely write new functions during the interactive
sessions, it is more like an ad hoc querying.
Now what I want is to keep logs of these interactive sessions as a
single running-through diary, which is not necessarily very
self-consistent. I should be able to put comments to both the commands
and their outputs ("here we compute the auto-correlations" is a comment
to the command, "note strong second lag correlation" is a comment to its
output). I want be able to re-execute parts of the commands in the
diary. I sometimes want to merge the new results with the old ones
_preserving_ the comments...
 
 
Please send your replies directly to me since I am _not_ subscribed to
ess-help (yet).
 
 
Your help will be greatly appreciated,
Vadim

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