Using MathJax in R's help system
On Wed, Feb 2, 2011 at 10:33 AM, Gong-Yi Liao <gong-yi.liao at uconn.edu> wrote:
Thank you for comments, ? 1. ? About MathJax's sheer size: ? ? ? ?I think we can consider the following two cases: ? ? ? ?A. ?The user starts nanohttpd on his/her own PC and read the ? ? ? ? ? ?help files in html ? ? ? ? ? ?(i.e. ? ?> options(help_type="html", browser="xdg_open") ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? > ?svd ?) ? ? ? ? ? ? ?For this case, I think that ?the user can just ?install a ? ? ? ? ? ? ?MathJax distribution on his/her own PC (or workstation) ? ? ? ? ? ? ?and let the local nanohttpd send the MathJax scripts, ? ? ? ? ? ? ?fonts and image files to user's browser. ?Since all the ? ? ? ? ? ? ?MathJax files are transmitted locally (i.e. at the same ? ? ? ? ? ? ?IP, on the same machine), I think 130 MB ?is not a big ? ? ? ? ? ? ?issue in this case.
But the user still needs to get it in some way - an additional installation step means that it's probably not suitable for inclusion with base R. It could possibly be bundled inside a package, using some tricks to keep all the files in a single zip file, which reduces the bundle size to a manageable 15 meg.
? ? ? ?B. ?The user reads the R help html pages, ?which are hosted by ? ? ? ? ? ?a third party httpd server ? ? ? ? ? ? For this case, I think a CDN (Content Delivery Network) ? ? ? ? ? ? hosting server is needed. MathJax's 130 MB size can be a ? ? ? ? ? ? critical issue in this case. ?As far as I know, there's ? ? ? ? ? ? a site ( mathjax.connectmv.com ) providing such service, ? ? ? ? ? ? but I can't imagine if all the R users around the world ? ? ? ? ? ? request resources from this site 24-7, the site must ? ? ? ? ? ? be DoSed.
Agreed.
? ?2. About the helpr package: ? ? ? ?I install the helpr package from CRAN, and, maybe due to my ? ? ? ?problem, ?the manual of this package is quite confusing to me. ? ? ? ?I run the command helpr and my browser shows me the following ? ? ? ?content:
Could you please provide a reproducible example?
The following steps should get you up and running:
install.packages("helpr")
library(helpr)
helpr()
The solr warnings will be removed in the next version - you can ignore
them for now.
Hadley
Assistant Professor / Dobelman Family Junior Chair Department of Statistics / Rice University http://had.co.nz/