[Rd] Citation for R

[Achim Zeileis]

On Tue, 14 Jun 2005 10:38:38 +1000 Gordon Smyth wrote:

> >Note also that R does have a User Guide, i.e., while there is plenty
> >of excellent documentation,
> >there is no single document which is a guide to the whole project.
> 
> Oops, I meant to write "R does not have a User Guide".
> 
> Just to explain this further, the citation() function asks me to cite
> a "Manual"

Well, @Manual indicates just the type of BibTeX entry which is the
closest thing you have in BibTeX as there is not @Software or something
similar.

> with the title "R: A language and environment for statistical 
> computing". Although R comes with excellent documentation, including
> at least 6 manuals on different aspects of the software, no manual or
> document with that title actually exists, as far as I know.

The idea is that you can cite the software as a whole which also has an
ISBN number which makes it good enough for many publishers to accept it
(and btw has also led to some faxes ordering the `book' "R: A Language
and..." in Vienna). Anyway, if it is possible to cite the software
directly, you don't want to have some surrogate paper which documents
part of the software, a much earlier version, or...
When it is not possible to cite software directly, it should be -
although I understand that this is not just as simple as saying it.
Z