Hi all,

I am not sure if this feature exists in the R-console command line prompt:

In Matlab, if I want to enter a command which is similar to what I have
entered before,

I can enter a few prefix, then press "->", the previous command that matches
with this prefix will then appear on this command line, and it saves a lot
of our time.

For example:

> abline(lm(new~old))
> cor(new, old)
...
...
... many lines entered
...
...

now I want to reuse "abline(lm(new~old))",

R-console provides "->" functionality to recall old commands, but it trace
back one by one, it is slow if "abline" is way back, say 50 lines above my
current command line... it is too slow.

In Matlab, I just need to enter "ab", then press "->", if there is no other
"ab******" between the "abline" and my current command line, then the
console will intelligently recall "abline" back to me... Very convinient.

Does this feature exist in R?

Any other good Integrated Developement Environment for R?

Perhaps R users are mathematicians and statisticians; but as a software
engineer myself, I found a Visual C++-like integrated developement
environment is really efficient and time-saving. It and Borland C++ Builder
basically sets standard for modern UI design for programming IDEs.

To be a good IDE, it really needs to have an embedded inline debugger. I've
asked a statistician, he said he never debugged using a break-point,
line-by-line execution debugger -- I cannot imagine this. Where is the
productivity?

I've used Tinn-R. Frankly it is quite creative. It solved the line-by-line
execution problem by copying the line and pasted it to R-console
automatically. But a lot of times clipboard generates error. And often times
the copy and paste within Tinn editor itself are problemetic. For example, I
have been never able to select a portion of a line. When I paste a
paragraph, it always erases the current line and the following lines,
instead of inserting, ...  and if I want to select one line, it always
select two lines for me... etc.

Anyway, I hope there is IDEs that are better than Tinn-R.

Thanks a lot!

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