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Rtips (was Re: [R] ? building a database with a the great examples

5 messages · Claude Rubinson, Paul Johnson, Detlef Steuer

Paul Johnson
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Perhaps you want to start maintaining Rtips itself!  

I don't have as much time for it as I used to.  I still think it is 
valuable to have such a listing, but it is so hard to keep up to date 
with R and I'm only doing minimal work to keep it up to date.  I'm 
thinking of dropping altogether the section on packages because I just 
can't keep up with the creativity of the R community.  I did most of 
that list before Frank Harrell put up Hmisc and Design, you know.

The Rtips page is still up here:

http://lark.cc.ukans.edu/~pauljohn/R/statsRus.html

The FaqManager software is starting to show its age, but it still works. 
 If you want to be a contributor, I could assign for you a password on 
that server.  

Also, I think it will work if you go to this other name I have created 
for this same thing:

http://lark.cc.ukans.edu/~pauljohn/R/Rtips.html

Some users write and ask me why I did not contribute this doc to the R 
homepage, and I have no good answer except that in the beginning I did 
not have enough stuff to make it worthwhile.  Since the content of Rtips 
can change on a daily/weekly basis, it did not seem right to just make a 
snapshot and email it over. But I'm open to suggestions.
Frank Mattes wrote:

            

      
      
      
    

        

  
    

      
      
    

  


  


    

    

      
      

        


  

        

      Claude Rubinson
    

    

      
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On Mon, Jun 02, 2003 at 12:19:32PM -0500, Paul E. Johnson wrote:

            

      
      
      
    

        
I'm wondering if there's demand/interest in a cookbook-style site
along the lines of ActiveState/O'Reilly's Perl and Python cookbook
sites.  (If you're not familiar with the cookbooks, they're databases
of user-supplied "recipes" illustrating various programming tips and
techniques.)  The advantage of the cookbooks are that, since users
supply the content, they take much of the demand off of the
maintainer(s).

I figure that a cookbook would probably be welcome (after all, who
doesn't like more information?).  So, I guess the real question is if
there are enough people who would be willing to contribute recipes on
an ongoing basis?  The R community is certainly smaller than that of
Perl or Python.

Thoughts?

Claude

  
  


  


      

    

    

      
      

        


  

        

      Detlef Steuer
    

    

      
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On 02-Jun-2003 Paul E. Johnson wrote:

            

      
      
      
    

        
Perhaps it is time to start a wiki for R?
For those not familiar with the idea of wikis look here:
http://www.wikipedia.org/ (incredible wiki encyclopedia)
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/WikiWiki (for a description of the mechanisms of
wikiwikis)

I just did a quick hack to set one up:
http://fawn.unibw-hamburg.de/cgi-bin/Rwiki.pl?RwikiHome

Any comments welcome!

If the community uses the site I promise to do what I can to keep it 
running.

Detlef

            

      
      
      
    

        

      
      
    

        
"There is no way to peace, peace is the way." -- Ghandi

Detlef Steuer --- http://fawn.unibw-hamburg.de/steuer.html
***** Encrypted mail preferred *****

  
  


  


      

    

    

      
      

        


  

        

      Paul Johnson
    

    

      
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I think there is a lot of merit in this idea.  I think there is a big 
question about "authentication" and protection of Wikis from vandalism.

I've set up Wikis for other projects that I started after Rtips.  I have 
not seen your Wiki software before,  but it looks pretty nice.  I see it 
does have diff support, so old pages can be restored, yes?  But it 
doesn't authenticate users, which causes me some concern.  (I understand 
the Wiki philosophy that we should not be concerned about 
authentication, but I've never bought into it all the way).

I have a TWiki site here:

http://www.ku.edu/cgiwrap/pauljohn/twiki/view

This one I hacked up special to use authentication on some pages so that 
people have to log in before they can edit.

I had not realized before I looked at your page that Wiki 
implementations are customized for document format.  For page sections, 
your Wiki uses

= aHeading =  

but Twiki uses

---+ aHeading

That's kindof a bummer.

        
Detlef Steuer wrote:

        

            

      
      
      
    

        

  
    

      
      
    

  


  


      

    

    

      
      

        


  

        

      Detlef Steuer
    

    

      
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On 03-Jun-2003 Paul E. Johnson wrote:

            

      
      
      
    

        
Yes. But I`ll do my daily backups, so major vandalism wouldn't be such a
problem. (I hope.)
Personally I don't like to have a list of people who are allowed to edit the
pages. (and I dont like to keep such a list current ...)
Under "preferences" you can choose to give yourself an identity, but that's not
for authentication.

            

      
      
      
    

        
Yes! It keeps the diffs for quite some time. So if anyone realizes minor, i.e.
pagewise, vandalism content can be rebuild.

            

      
      
      
    

        
I think the R community is growing very fast. The work to give
passwords to interested people frightens me. And I would never ask
for such a password personally. I'm willing to write some short note _now_, but
not if I have to wait a day or so to get access. Authentication fits if you
have a well defined group you expect to add contents. 

My position therefore: give it a try. If vandalism turns out to be a problem,
I'll have to think about it.

            

      
      
      
    

        
Yes. I don't understand the authors of wikis, too. I just chose a recommended
 one. If there is anything serious against UseModWiki, _now_ would be the
time to switch. UseMod is very easy to set up, an needs little resources.
These two points are very important for me. 


detlef