[R-gui] Seeking comments/testers for a new GUI

[Ian Fellows]

Vitalie,

Thanks for the comments.

Regarding Rcmdr... I really like what Dr. Fox has done with it, but have
found that the GUI is a bit clunky (due to the toolkit) and doesn't really
help me do my analyses faster (which is NOT one of its stated goals). For
example, if I want to do 10 t-tests, I have to go through the t-test dialog
10 times, and each time it doesn't remember what my options were the last
time. To do the same thing in Deducer requires 6 mouse clicks, and the
result is given in a nicely formatted table.

Regarding JGR... I'm interested to know what features you would like to see
in JGR to make it fit your needs more. There are a couple of newer features
which have made it suit my needs better. We recently added preference items
to change the output and command colors, as well as the editor syntax
coloring which can now psuedo-emulate the coloring of emacs, xcode, ecplise,
vim, and visual studio. Auto-tabbing was also added, though it is simplistic
as of yet. What features would you like to see in a console?

Regarding other platforms... Right now the code is tied into JGR, but it
wouldn't be too hard to port it to a different platform. JGR has the
advantage that it is fully Java based, which make the development of Deducer
easier. I don't really know much about ess or sciviews, but in order to be
used, a platform would need 1. access to rJava 2. a way to enter commands
into the terminal from java 3. a way to add menu items and hook them up to
java methods. For the time being I'm pretty committed to using JGR, when
Deducer is more mature I'll think about supporting others. 


Ian

-----Original Message-----
From: Vitalie S. [mailto:vitosmail at rambler.ru] 
Sent: Wednesday, June 17, 2009 12:57 AM
To: Fellows, Ian; r-sig-gui at stat.math.ethz.ch
Subject: Re: [R-gui] Seeking comments/testers for a new GUI


> 2. Increase the efficiency of expert R users when performing common  
> tasks by
> replacing hundreds of keystrokes with a few mouse clicks.

Nice idea indeed. Akin to Rcmder. But as Rcmder Deducer uses obscure  
editor as platform. It's highly improbable that an "expert" user of R  
would use JGR for their work.

I wonder, why not to direct this valuable effort towards  extending fully  
customizable editors like ESS or SciViews-K  
(http://www.sciviews.org/SciViews-K/index.html  )?

This would nicely facilitate  beginner's start with advanced editors as  
well.

Vitalie.