[R] Problems in Recommending R

[Wacek Kusnierczyk]

Gabor Grothendieck wrote:
> On Tue, Feb 3, 2009 at 9:20 AM, hadley wickham <h.wickham at gmail.com> wrote:
>   
>>> Again I'd disagree, perhaps the most widely used suite of software has a
>>> very simple and clean web-site with few bells and whistles, ditto for one of
>>> the most popular text-editors.  I am of course referring to the suite of GNU
>>> utilities (http://www.gnu.org/) that make a working GNU/Linux distribution
>>> and Emacs (http://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/ ).
>>>
>>> I like the R web-site, its clean and simple, present key information
>>> prominently (manuals, docs, CRAN, RNew and mailing lists).
>>>       
>> Have you ever used the R website?
>>
>> To download the latest version for R for windows you have to:
>>
>>  1. avoid clicking on the "R version 2.8.1" link - that takes you to a
>> directory listing of strangely named files
>>
>>  2. recognise that you need to click on an CRAN (what is a cran?)
>>
>>  3. successfully select a mirror that is up-to-date (with no
>> information about which mirrors are up-to-date)
>>
>>  4. click Windows (ok, this one is easy)
>>
>>  5. guess that base is the "distribution" that you want
>>
>>  6. phew, you're there (but don't follow the advice to download from a
>> mirror near you or you'll be back at step 3)
>>
>>     
>
> Its even more confusing than that because actually you're not there
> yet!  You have to click on the unobtrusive patched link and then
> download that or you get the version with the bugs.
>
>   

... while you generally prefer the new bugs.  otherwise, when you report
a problem, you're (sometimes kindly) asked to upgrade -- and here you go
again.


vQ