[R] Strategy for maintaining R in student PC labs

[peter dalgaard]

On Aug 16, 2010, at 12:39 PM, Fiona Mary Underwood wrote:

> Dear All
> 
> At institutes where there are PC labs used by Masters and undergraduate
> students and software is maintained /managed by a central IT services,
> do you always update R every time a new version is released - around
> beginning of April and October? Do you also ask them to install all
> patch releases as they turn up?
> 
> Currently our IT department update once a year before the start of the
> Autumn Term. This would mean that this year they would update to version
> 2.11.1 and would just miss 2.12.0 and would not update again until
> September 2011. I think we might need a more flexible strategy than this
> and am curious how others manage it.

Well, to each their own, but it is not uncommon for people to update once per semester, typically to the highest numbered release (i.e., 2.11.1 currently), and this is what our release schedule is calibrated against. We usually try to ensure that that version is free of major (known) issues, with only a few minor items fixed in the unreleased ("R-patched") version, and generally things that are not classroom-critical. ".0" versions are a mixed blessing: They have new features, but now and again also serious errors which only get found when people start using them.

> 
> Thanks in advance
> 
> Fiona
> 
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> 
> Dr Fiona M. Underwood
> 
> Lecturer in Applied Statistics
> 
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> 
> 
> 
> 
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> 
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-- 
Peter Dalgaard
Center for Statistics, Copenhagen Business School
Solbjerg Plads 3, 2000 Frederiksberg, Denmark
Phone: (+45)38153501
Email: pd.mes at cbs.dk  Priv: PDalgd at gmail.com