[R-SIG-Mac] suggestion to improve R GUI on Mac OS X

[Deryk Wenaus]

Hi Simon,

thanks for the responses. yes I did mean the editor built into the R app. Ctrl-A is helpful, I'll try the unix way, and try to let go of the mac way Cmd-Left Arrow :)

Also, I tried to install the R.plist that is floating around for texwrangler, the younger sibling of BBEdit, but at first i had no luck with the instructions. The folder they said to put it into does not exist for bbedit: "~/Library/Application Support/BBEdit/Language 
Modules/". So today I tried creating the folder (not something I like to do in the Library folder) and it works fine in BBedit. You have to make sure to map .R to the R language as well in the BBEdit preferences. The latest file was found here: http://homepages.nyu.edu/~jmb736/code/R_language_module_for_BBEdit/R.plist and there was also an interesting pdf found here:  http://tr.im/KBw8

Cheers,
Deryk

-----------------------------
Deryk Wenaus
derykw at gmail.com
University of Waterloo
Independent Studies

On 2010-01-15, at 9:25 PM, Simon Urbanek wrote:

> 
> On Jan 15, 2010, at 5:35 PM, David Winsemius wrote:
> 
>> 
>> On Jan 15, 2010, at 12:42 PM, Deryk Wenaus wrote:
>> 
>>> Hi,
>>> 
>>> I've been using R for a little while and have a simple suggestion to improve usability.
>>> 
>>> While I find the match brace/quotes feature in R! to be handy, especially when writing new code, it is problematic when I am editing existing code. For example, if I want to add an R command around an existing command, I always get () when I just need (.
>>> 
>>> I suggest changing the behaviour so that if there is a space or nothing to the right of the cursor then if you type in ( you get ( ). But if there is a character to the right of the cursor, disable this auto-adding. So if you type in ( you get (.
> 
> 
> Interesting idea - I'll have look ...
> 
> 
>>> 
>>> One last item, When I am on the R command line and press Command-Left Arrow. I want to go to the beginning of the R prompt, ( after the > ) but instead I end up BEFORE the > prompt - not a good place to be! Is there any way to change this behaviour?
>> 
>> Learn cmd-A
> 
> It is really <Ctrl><A> - the unix way. I dimly remember that there was some issue with <Cmd><Left> when I was implementing it, but if it comes to worst the you can simply remap it the plist. I may re-visit the issue ..
> 
> 
>>> The last issue seems to be a minor bug with Undo in the built in editor. Sometimes when I use undo, the last character in one of the lines deleted does not get deleted. - usually it is a ) or }.  At least R is being less destructive. but it is strange nonetheless.
>>> 
>>> What is the best editor for Mac OS X? the built in editor,
>> 
>> Which I think is vim, is that right?
>> 
> 
> No, I think Deryk meant the built-in one, literally, (= built in the R.app).
> 
> Cheers,
> Simon
> 
> 
>>> or BBEdit, or TextMate? I have BBEdit,
>> 
>> Opinions vary and are generally based on a trade-off of power (Emacs/AlphaMacs) versus ease of learning (TextWrangler).
>> 
>>> but could not find how to add a new language using the R.plist that is around.
>> 
>> I think you would change the .plist for the editor, rather than for R.
>> 
>> I think TextWrangler is a subset of BBedit, right? There are descriptions on the web for configuration of TextWrangler for R syntax highlighting that I have used successfully.
>> 
>> 
>>> 
>> -- 
>> 
>> David Winsemius, MD
>> Heritage Laboratories
>> West Hartford, CT
>> 
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>