[Rd] what is the best way for an external interface to interact with graphics, libraries

[Simon Urbanek]

On Sep 7, 2010, at 2:21 PM, ghostwheel wrote:

> 
> Another message about the R to TeXmacs interface.
> 
> 1. Graphics
> The TeXmacs interface allows the user to directly insert graphics into the
> session. 
> 
> Since I am not very familiar with programming for R, I implemented the
> interaction with graphics in a very primitive way. It was two modes of
> working: with X11, and without (for example when working remotely through
> ssh without forwarding X11).
> 
> In both cases the user has to invoke a command, v(), in order to insert the
> current graph into the buffer at the current place.
> 
> With X11, the way it works is that when v() is invoked I call recordPlot(),
> then open a postscript file, then replayPlot(), and then close the
> postscript file and insert it into the session.
> 
> Without X11, I open a postscript file ahead of time, then when v() is
> called, I close it, and insert it into the session, and then open a new
> postscript file.
> 
> Obviously quite primitive.I think ideally would be if everything was
> transparent to the user - the user does a plot, and the plot is inserted
> into the buffer right away, and later, updates to the same plot update the
> original plot where it is. But to be able to do that I need to be able to
> generate the postscript file of the current plot, and be notified somehow
> whenever the plot changes.
> 
> Is all that possible? Is there a better way to implement this all?
> 

I don't know the mechanics of the actual "inserting" in TeXmac but it would be trivial to simply create a copy of the plot as EPS (or whatever is needed) at the time of insertion. See dev.copy2eps() for a function that does exactly that.



> 2. Libraries
> 
> A remotely related question is this: the interface with TeXmacs generates
> menus that depend on the currently loaded libraries.

Libraries are not "loaded" (see .libPath() for handling libraries) - but chances are that you meant packages...


> I'd like to be able to
> update the menus whenever a new library is loaded. Is there a possibility to
> have a function called whenever this happens? Or would it be advisable to
> change the global 'library' function?
> 

I would strongly advise against the latter. A reasonably simple way would be to check the search path - if it changed a package has been loaded. A natural place to do such check would be in a top-level task handler for example.

Cheers,
Simon