[R] R Style Guide -- Was Post-hoc tests in MASS using glm.nb

Thu May 19 03:28:57 CEST 2011

  Another style guide is at:
http://www1.maths.lth.se/help/R/RCC/

Listed as a first draft and dated 2005, but still worth a read. Has some 
references also.

I think I recall Hadley having a style guide which he requested his 
students followed, but I didn't like it too much (sorry Hadley) .

I am with Bill that style guides should be consulted and their 
recommendations considered, but it is personal preference as to which 
rules one accepts. I don't find it objectionable if someone has written 
in a style I don't particularly like, but it is objectionable if no 
thought has been given to programming style.

David Scott

On 19/05/11 10:26, Bill.Venables at csiro.au wrote:
> Hi Bert,
>
> I think people should know about the Google Sytle Guide for R because, as I said, it represents a thoughtful contribution to the debate.  Most of its advice is very good (meaning I agree with it!) but some is a bit too much (for example, the blanket advice never to use S4 classes and methods - that's just resisting progress, in my view).  The advice on using<- for the (normal) assingment operator rather than = is also good advice, (according to me), but people who have to program in both C and R about equally often may find it a bit tedious.  We can argue over that one.
>
> I suggest it has a place in the R FAQ but with a suitable warning that this is just one view, albeit a thougtful one.  I don't think it need be included in the posting guide, though.  It would take away some of the fun.  :-)
>
> Bill Venables.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Bert Gunter [mailto:gunter.berton at gene.com]
> Sent: Wednesday, 18 May 2011 11:47 PM
> To: Venables, Bill (CMIS, Dutton Park)
> Cc: r-help at r-project.org
> Subject: R Style Guide -- Was Post-hoc tests in MASS using glm.nb
>
> Thanks Bill. Do you and others think that a link to this guide (or
> another)should be included in the Posting Guide and/or R FAQ?
>
> -- Bert
>
> On Tue, May 17, 2011 at 4:07 PM,<Bill.Venables at csiro.au>  wrote:
>> Amen to all of that, Bert.  Nicely put.  The google style guide (not perfect, but a thoughtful contribution on these kinds of issues, has avoiding attach() as its very first line.  See http://google-styleguide.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/google-r-style.html)
>>
>> I would add, though, that not enough people seem yet to be aware of within(...), a companion of with(...) in a way, but used for modifying data frames or other kinds of list objects.  It should be seen as a more flexible replacement for transform() (well, almost).
>>
>> The difference between with() and within() is as follows:
>>
>> with(data, expr, ...)
>>
>> allows you to evaluate 'expr' with 'data' providing the primary source for variables, and returns *the evaluated expression* as the result.  By contrast
>>
>> within(data, expr, ...)
>>
>> again uses 'data' as the primary source for variables when evaluating 'expr', but now 'expr' is used to modify the varibles in 'data' and returns *the modified data set* as the result.
>>
>> I use this a lot in the data preparation phase of a project, especially, which is usually the longest, trickiest, most important, but least discussed aspect of any data analysis project.
>>
>> Here is a simple example using within() for something you cannot do in one step with transform():
>>
>> polyData<- within(data.frame(x = runif(500)), {
>>   x2<- x^2
>>   x3<- x*x2
>>   b<- runif(4)
>>   eta<- cbind(1,x,x2,x3) %*% b
>>   y<- eta + rnorm(x, sd = 0.5)
>>   rm(b)
>> })
>>
>> check:
>>
>>> str(polyData)
>> 'data.frame':   500 obs. of  5 variables:
>>   $ x  : num  0.5185 0.185 0.5566 0.2467 0.0178 ...
>>   $ y  : num [1:500, 1] 1.343 0.888 0.583 0.187 0.855 ...
>>   $ eta: num [1:500, 1] 1.258 0.788 1.331 0.856 0.63 ...
>>   $ x3 : num  1.39e-01 6.33e-03 1.72e-01 1.50e-02 5.60e-06 ...
>>   $ x2 : num  0.268811 0.034224 0.309802 0.060844 0.000315 ...
>> Bill Venables.
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: r-help-bounces at r-project.org [mailto:r-help-bounces at r-project.org] On Behalf Of Bert Gunter
>> Sent: Wednesday, 18 May 2011 12:08 AM
>> To: Peter Ehlers
>> Cc: R list
>> Subject: Re: [R] Post-hoc tests in MASS using glm.nb
>>
>> Folks:
>>
>>> Only if the user hasn't yet been introduced to the with() function,
>>> which is linked to on the ?attach page.
>>>
>>> Note also this sentence from the ?attach page:
>>>   ".... attach can lead to confusion."
>>>
>>> I can't remember the last time I needed attach().
>>>
>>> Peter Ehlers
>> Yes. But perhaps it might be useful to flesh this out with a bit of
>> commentary. To this end, I invite others to correct or clarify the
>> following.
>>
>> The potential "confusion" comes from requiring R to search for the
>> data. There is a rigorous process by which this is done, of course,
>> but it requires that the runtime environment be consistent with that
>> process, and the programmer who wrote the code may not have control
>> over that environment. The usual example is that one has an object
>> named,say,  "a" in the formula and in the attached data and another
>> "a" also in the global environment. Then the wrong "a" would be found.
>> The same thing can happen if another data set gets attached in a
>> position before the one of interest. (Like Peter, I haven't used
>> attach() in so long that I don't know whether any warning messages are
>> issued in such cases).
>>
>> Using the "data = " argument when available or the with() function
>> when not avoids this potential confusion and tightly couples the data
>> to be analyzed with the analysis.
>>
>> I hope this clarifies the previous posters' comments.
>>
>> Cheers,
>> Bert
>>
>>> [... non-germane material snipped ...]
>>>
>>> ______________________________________________
>>> R-help at r-project.org mailing list
>>> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help
>>> PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html
>>> and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> "Men by nature long to get on to the ultimate truths, and will often
>> be impatient with elementary studies or fight shy of them. If it were
>> possible to reach the ultimate truths without the elementary studies
>> usually prefixed to them, these would not be preparatory studies but
>> superfluous diversions."
>>
>> -- Maimonides (1135-1204)
>>
>> Bert Gunter
>> Genentech Nonclinical Biostatistics
>>
>> ______________________________________________
>> R-help at r-project.org mailing list
>> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help
>> PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html
>> and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
>>
>
>

-- 
_________________________________________________________________
David Scott	Department of Statistics
		The University of Auckland, PB 92019
		Auckland 1142,    NEW ZEALAND
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Email:	d.scott at auckland.ac.nz,  Fax: +64 9 373 7018