[Rd] Interaction between callNextMethod() and selectMethod()

Hervé Pagès hpages at fhcrc.org
Sun Aug 5 03:49:49 CEST 2012


On 08/03/2012 11:44 PM, peter dalgaard wrote:
>
> On Aug 4, 2012, at 01:24 , Hervé Pagès wrote:
>
>> BTW, it's funny that the VERSION file in the R source tree says:
>>
>>   hpages at latitude:~/src/R-2.16.r59963$ cat VERSION
>>   2.16.0 Under development (unstable)
>>   ^^^^^^
>
> What's funny about that? We no longer display the number on startup and at some point we may not even use it for an actual release, but there needs to be a number to test "R >= 2.14.0"-style dependencies and such.
>

What's funny is that even if we try to pretend that the version
number doesn't matter, it actually does matter. Not only for
"R >= 2.14.0"-style dependencies and such, but also for human communication:

- Can't install that package!
- Works for me. What version of R are you using?
- "Unsuffered Consequences"
- I'm using "Roasted Marshmallows", you should upgrade to
   that one.
- I'm confused I thought I was running the latest.
- No "Roasted Marshmallows" is the latest.
- Are you sure? How do you know?

etc, etc...

It reminds me of Mozilla plans to hide Firefox version:

   https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=678775

AFAIK they finally abandoned it :-)

H.

-- 
Hervé Pagès

Program in Computational Biology
Division of Public Health Sciences
Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
1100 Fairview Ave. N, M1-B514
P.O. Box 19024
Seattle, WA 98109-1024

E-mail: hpages at fhcrc.org
Phone:  (206) 667-5791
Fax:    (206) 667-1319



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