[R-pkg-devel] Is using global assignment in package tests allowed?

On Thu, 27 Jan 2022 08:55:49 -0600

Because of some aspect of how testthat works (which is beyond my
ken), I have only been able to get my tests to work by using global
assignment (<<-) to create some objects on which the tests are then
run.

What are you trying to achieve? Perhaps there's a better way to do
that. I think that you can ask testthat-specific questions at
<https://community.rstudio.com/> if they turn out to be too far from
base R.

Does anyone know whether this policy applies to all code within the
package, including unit tests? Or does it apply just to the code and
functions in /R?

I'm not a CRAN member, but I think that the spirit of the rule only
covers the user-accessible code, and tests aren't typically run in the
same R session where the user objects live. For the same reason, I
think that it's acceptable to test internal interfaces you don't want
to export by calling them by means of package:::function.

Best regards,
Ivan