[R-wiki] Top level organization

[Gabor Grothendieck]

On 2/4/06, Gabor Grothendieck <ggrothendieck at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 2/4/06, Philippe Grosjean <phgrosjean at sciviews.org> wrote:
> > Gabor Grothendieck wrote:
> > > On 2/3/06, Ben Bolker <bolker at zoo.ufl.edu> wrote:
> > >
> > >>Gabor Grothendieck wrote:
> > >>
> > >>
> > >>>>[GG]
> > >>>>A few comments:
> > >>>>
> > >>>>
> > >>>>>- what is the difference among Manuals, Cookbooks and Tips and Tricks.
> > >>>>>Its not clear to me.
> > >>>>
> > >>>> [BB]
> > >>>>  Manuals and "cookbooks" are longer and by a single or a few authors;
> > >>>>tips and tricks are shorter and more collaborative (I've tried to
> > >>>>clarify a little bit by adding a few short descriptions to
> > >>>>"start2").  That said, I think the subdivision within "Guides"
> > >>>
> > >>>[GG]
> > >>>This is still not clear..  There are THREE categories currently,
> > >>>not two.  The three possible categories I can see are:
> > >>>
> > >>>- official R manuals.  The official manuals that come with R wifieid.
> > >>>- other R documents.  Contributions from users.
> > >>>- snippets.  Paul Johnson's collection, etc.
> > >>>
> > >>>Is that the distinction?  Should it be?
> > >>>
> > >>
> > >>Are you looking at http://www.sciviews.org/_rgui/wiki/doku.php?id=start2
> > >>?   it has "Getting Started", "Guides", "Tips & Tricks", "R Packages",
> > >>"R Documentation", "Links", "Miscellaneous".
> > >>  I would say "R Documentation" = your category #1
> > >>              "Guides" = your category #2
> > >>              "Tips & Tricks" = your category #3
> > >>
> > >>  I like this set of categories and (for the most part) names for them.
> > >>
> > >>  I can imagine arguing some more about the proper name for Tips&Tricks
> > >>(=  Snippets = Short examples & notes = Rtips and other stuff = Code
> > >>library = Shorter material = ... ?); I can also imagine that "R
> > >>Packages" needs some clarification (what's in here? notes on R packages?
> > >>Wikified documentation -- or is that in "R Documentation", which claims
> > >>to have help for all of CRAN and Bioconductor?)
> > >
> > >
> > > Yes, I am looking at that link.  Reproducing part of it here:
> > >
> > > Getting Started
> > > Do you want to know what R is, or do you want to start using it? Get
> > > started. I tried to make the section header into a link to
> > > getting-started:getting-started, but DocuWiki didn't seem to
> > > understand ...
> > >
> > > What is R? – A short explanation and a few examples of R's potential
> > > Case studies – People explain how and why they started to use R
> > > R installation – All you need to know to install R and additional R packages
> > > Reference cards – Brief overviews of tasks and associated commands
> > > Translations – To and from other statistics packages and computer
> > > languages provide link to foreign-language information?
> > > FAQ – Beginners' Frequently Asked Questions
> > >
> > > Guides
> > > Longer documents introducing R, demonstrating particular kinds of
> > > analyses, or describing how R is used in particular fields previous
> > > link was to tutorials:tutorials. Was that right??
> > >
> > > Demonstrations – Let you drive and look how R works
> > > Tutorials – Let you drive, but do it yourself
> > > Manuals – Textbooks, classical approach
> > >     Statistics with R
> > > Cookbooks – Textbooks, learn-by-example approach
> > >
> > > Tips & Tricks
> > > ...
> > >
> > > Now the last three are Manuals, Cookbooks and Tips and Tricks.
> > > To me a cookbook is the same as tips and tricks.  For example
> > > there are a number of O'Reilly published books called cookbooks
> > > that are collections of snippets.
> > >
> > > Thus we need to get rid of the cookbooks category.
> > >
> > > Also what is Statistics with R?  Is that a statistics book that
> > > happens to use R?
> >
> > It "happens" to be something like that! It is
> > http://www.sciviews.org/_rgui/wiki/doku.php?id=tutorials:stats-with-r:00stats-with-r,
> > that is a large document kindly donated to R Wiki by his author (but
> > someone still has to convert it - I did the first page, to determine how
> > much work it is -actually, less than I was thinking initially-)!
> >
> > Philippe
> >
> > P.S.: it is one thing to construct the structure of the Wiki, it is
> > another thing to fill it! I am absolutely against any structure that
> > would look much like an empty shell. Understand: if you propose sections
> > (you were very imaginative for 'Getting Started', and I thank you for
> > that), just keep in mind that we also have to fill these section with a
> > very minimum amount of material before we launch the Wiki (was it
> > planned for the end of the month?) So, may be now is it time to stop
> > working on the structure, and to start working on the content, as
> > suggested by Ben.
> >
> > > If so, that is not a manual and those
> > > should not be listed under manuals or else manuals needs
> > > to be a different word.  I am not sure what is intended here.
>
> Actually I think a good top level structure set up as early as possible
> would make a big difference because it would make the entire project
> easier to navigate.
>

Is there any method of having the link itself indicate how much
is available via that link so that, for example, if there is nothing
there one does not have to bother clicking it.

For example, at this page we can see at a glance how much info
is under each link:

http://www.google.com/Top/Computers/Programming/Languages/Python/?il=1