[Rd] Any interest in "merge" and "by" implementations specifically for so

[Kevin B. Hendricks]

Hi Tom,

> Whether or not the R core developers want to merge these functions  
> in base
> R, they would make a great little package on CRAN. That way others  
> could
> easily use them, and for yourself, the package automatically gets  
> updated
> with new versions of R. It sounds like you're done with the hard  
> parts. All
> that you need to do is add some documentation along with a couple of
> configuration files, and you're done.

Thomas Lumley recommended the same thing last night.  I have just  
finished debugging the routines and validating them for use without  
NAs.  I had to fix a number of typos in my code for the other  
functions but now they all work properly.  I still need to test,  
debug, and validate them for use of NAs with na.rm set to both true  
and  false.

Once I have validated them (ie. that they return the exact same  
things as unlist(lappy(split(x,i),FUNCTION)) does), I will get  
together an external package and make it available on CRAN.

I am in the stupid position of knowing how to add the functions  
internally to R with no problems, but I still have to learn how to  
build and add external packages.

So something else to learn!

Thanks,

Kevin