[Rd] proposal to allow just transcript files (output only) in the 'tests' directory

[Bill Dunlap]

On Tue, 20 Feb 2007, Tony Plate wrote:

> Currently, as far as I can see, both input and output fles must be
> supplied in the 'tests' directory (the input in a '.R' file, and the
> output in a corresponding '.Rout.save' file.)  Often, the '.R' file is
> redundant, as it could be reconstructed by simply stripping the commands
> out of the '.Rout.save' file.  E.g., the command
> $ sed -n -e 's/^[>+] //p' ./src/library/stats/tests/nls.Rout.save
> produces the same R commands as in ./src/library/stats/tests/nls.R

Some output lines start with "+ ".  E.g., in
    gamlss/tests/manual.Rout.save
I see
    > mod3<-stepAIC(mod1, scope=list(lower=~1,upper=~(x1+x2+x3+x4+x5+x6)^2))
    Distribution parameter:  mu
    Start:  AIC= 319.16
     y ~ x1 + x2 + x3 + x4 + x5 + x6

            Df    AIC
    + x4:x5  1 307.07
    + x1:x5  1 316.94
    - x6     1 317.16
so R would try to parse "x4:x5  1 307.07".

You could use awk so the "^+ " lines had to immediately
follow "^> " (or a properly preceded "^+ "), but I suspect
there will still be problems.

I have experimented with similar things to compare Splus
and R output for the same commands.  Having the original
input lines helps there.  The hard part is parsing the output
so it can be recognized as a matrix, a vector with names,
an expression, lm() output, etc.  Then I could see that
the following outputs are equivalent:

   R    :
   R    : Call:
   R    : lm(formula = log(x) ~ x, data = list(x = 1:10))
   R    :
   R    : Coefficients:
   R    : (Intercept)            x
   R    :      0.2432       0.2304
   R    :

   Splus: Call:
   Splus: lm(formula = log(x) ~ x, data = list(x = 1:10))
   Splus:
   Splus: Coefficients:
   Splus:  (Intercept)         x
   Splus:    0.2432038 0.2304068
   Splus:
   Splus: Degrees of freedom: 10 total; 8 residual
   Splus: Residual standard error: 0.2388027

This would also be handy for comparing results in different versions of
R, where low level printing routines may be changed a bit.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bill Dunlap
Insightful Corporation
bill at insightful dot com
360-428-8146

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