Seth Falcon wrote:
> John Chambers <jmc@r-project.org> writes:
>   
>> Yes, that's why showMethods() has the option includeDefs=TRUE to
>> include the definitions.  There are other options to look at multiple
>> functions or specific classes.  Look at ?showMethods
>>     
>
> A feature request: it would be useful in the context of attempting to
> build documentation helper tools to have a return value that was
> more structured than what printTo=FALSE provides.
>   
Maybe, but the question is what. 

I agree that the printTo=FALSE is largely useless.  It's a relic from 
some initial design attempts to make the output more flexible.

If you look at all the options to showMethods(), with multiple 
functions, classes, and optional definitions, a single structure for all 
of them may be pretty clumsy.

It would help to know what people plan to do with such an object.
>> And no, it's not a bug in getMethods(), which was never intended for
>> human-readable output, but a side-effect of the changes for faster
>> caching and dispatch in 2.4.0.  With the use of environments in place
>> of the methods list objects (returned by getMethods()), getMethods()
>> will probably be deprecated in the next version.
>>     
>
> I was expecting a different result based on the first sentence in the
> doc describing getMethods:
>
>      The function 'getMethods' returns all the methods for a particular
>      generic (in the form of a generic function with the methods
>      information in its environment).
>
> Hence, it surprises me that not all methods are returned.  Reading on
> I now see:
>
>      ... is not intended to be called directly.
>
> So I guess I got what I deserve ;-)
>   
The documentation needs some clarification, for 2.4.1
> + seth
>
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