[R-sig-Geo] R Geo interact with Web Browser?

[Barry Rowlingson]

On Wed, Oct 17, 2012 at 5:14 PM, Paul Ricci <pricci at kitsolutions.net> wrote:
> Can R be integrated into a web browser mapping application to generate
> charts and graphs?  We are utilizing ASP.Net version 3.5 to build our
> data visualization web application.  Could it interface using HTML and
> javascripts?  If it can interface would there be any browser specific
> limitations (eg. Firefox, Safari)?

 It can't run on the browser, that's for sure, so you are really
looking at a server-side application. R can generate HTML, you can
even use something like 'brew' to create templates that get filled in
with computed R values.

 R won't be much use if you want interactive charts and graphs,
although I reckon clever things can probably be done with SVG
graphics. You'd be much better off using a client-side Javascript
charting library - look into D3.js - but you could drive this from
data generated via an R server back-end.

 Personally I'd ditch ASP.Net and save a fortune in license costs by
going all-open source with a Python-based server solution.

Barry