[R] Session log file...

[Martin Maechler]

>>>>> "Pascal" == Pascal A Niklaus <Pascal.Niklaus at unibas.ch>
>>>>>     on Wed, 17 Dec 2003 16:52:07 +0100 writes:

    Pascal> Hi all,
    Pascal> I tried to save a complete log of a R session we had in a seminar 
    Pascal> today... but I didn't succeed.

    Pascal> 1) R | tee session.log
    Pascal> This saves both input and output, but I do get the cursor key escape 
    Pascal> sequences from editing (cursor-up to get last command etc) instead of 
    Pascal> the actual command line executed.

    Pascal> 2) savehistory
    Pascal> Gets commands only, not the output

    Pascal> 3) sink
    Pascal> Gets output, without the commands producing them

    Pascal> I'm sure I'm not the first one encountering this
    Pascal> problem - there's for sure a solution, but I didn't
    Pascal> manage to find it. If there is no such thing, would
    Pascal> it make sense to add such a function to R?

There has been a solution to this problem for a longer time than
R exists: 
  ESS (Emacs Speaks Statistitics, called "S-mode" in
       those days, and used for S and then S-plus).
  
  You work with an (or several) *R* buffer with the whole log
  that you (can edit even during use and) save at the end as,
  e.g.  sess.Rout
  {using *.Rout will make emacs/ESS use the ESS-transcript mode
   when opening that file later; in ESS-transcript mode, you can
   again send the (old) input lines to a running R process, by
   simple <Enter>.}

Probably for that reason, nobody of us (developers) has ever
felt enough need for an alternative to implement another one
(platform independently!).

Martin Maechler <maechler at stat.math.ethz.ch>	http://stat.ethz.ch/~maechler/
Seminar fuer Statistik, ETH-Zentrum  LEO C16	Leonhardstr. 27
ETH (Federal Inst. Technology)	8092 Zurich	SWITZERLAND
phone: x-41-1-632-3408		fax: ...-1228			<><