I'm currently developing several tools in R that I'd like to deploy for use
by multiple analysts in my research group. Many of the analysts have no
background in using R (but have plenty of experience with SAS), so part of
my effort will be in training them to use the new tools. Some of the
analyses will be too computationally intensive for our regulation 32 bit
Windows desktops, however they will run on a 64 bit machine.

I would like to provide our IT department with advice regarding a suitable
R server that can handle multiple users. R-studio offers a client/server
model that would allow us to run the server under a linux platform without
requiring users to learn linux.  An alternative (less preferable) solution
would be to run a windows server (as we currently do for SAS) which would
require users to log on to the server via a Windows session in order to run
R.

While I've already searched the R newsgroups and obtained some ideas toward
a solution, I'm wondering if anyone out there has more recent or current
advice (particularly regarding suitable hardware choice and server setup).
I would like to find a solution that would allow me to rapidly deploy R
solutions to collaborators (all within my computer network) who do not
necessarily have much background in R or linux. All data files and data
would be accessed via our networked filesystem (unless, of course they are
so huge that moving them locally to the server would impact processing
time). I'm trying to avoid minimal per-user setup hassle and perceived
inconvenience of running R.

The system should be able to handle about 5 intensive jobs and up to 20
users simultaneously.

Any advice would be appreciated!

Thanks,
Carrie Greene Wager, PhD
New England Research Institutes
Watertown, MA

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