[R] $ operator is invalid for atomic vectors, returning NULL - what is the right thing to do then?

[Søren Højsgaard]

Dear all,
Starting from a recent version of R, the $ became "unusable" on atomic vectors, e.g.
> x <- c(a=1,b=2)
> x$a
NULL
Warning message:
In x$a : $ operator is invalid for atomic vectors, returning NULL
 
I can of course do
> x['a']
- but that requires more typing (5 characters rather than 2). 
 
Apologies if I've missed a an announcement regarding this, but
1) Is there an alternative to the ['a'] and
2) Why was this change made?
 
Regards
Søren