[R] FW: S+ Script Files for R???

[Duncan Murdoch]

On Mon, 12 May 2003 12:31:33 +0100, Douglas Beare
<D.Beare at marlab.ac.uk> wrote:

>
>
>> Hi List,
>> I'm trying to get a bunch of hardened S+ users to switch to R.  They won't
>> move because they have got addicted to the S+ (.ssc)
>> scripting files, available for MS windows versions.  In these files you
>> highlight the code you want to execute by mouse, press an arrow in the
>> menu, and it fires it off to the S+ compiler directly.  Is such a facility
>> actually available for Linux/Windows and Unix versions of R? Is there
>> something similar out there?

That's the nicest feature in the S-PLUS environment, and its something
I'd like in Rgui (but it's not there yet, and it probably won't be
there in 1.8.0 in the fall).

There are various possibilities for replacements.  If the users are
comfortable in EMACS, then ESS provides something very similar.  If
they aren't, it might be worth learning.  This is available on both
Windows and Linux.  Right now I'd say it's the best choice, but
learning EMACS is non-trivial.

Some external text editors in Windows (e.g. WinEDT) have macro
packages that let you highlight and paste text to the R console quite
easily.  I don't know if this approach has been done on Linux.  

I don't use either of the above; I tend to develop in an external
editor, and just use source() or plain old cut and paste to execute.

There are also some new front-ends in the works.  See the R-GUI web
page http://www.r-project.org/GUI and mailing list for current status.

Duncan Murdoch