[R-pkg-devel] Proper way to ask a user to set permanent variables?

Hi Dirk,

The package-local environment is definitely a good approach (I use it
myself an a few packages). And the options() are nice as they represent a
standardised interface in R (Note to myself: I should use these more in my
packages).

But unless I am missing something, these are not persistent between
sessions? I assume, that is not an issue in your case?

Cheers,

Rainer

On 15 Jan 2020, at 23:47, Dirk Eddelbuettel <edd at debian.org> wrote:


Jonathan,

In all but one (maybe two?) of my packages I found relying on options()
sufficient. I usually follow the somewhat-common pattern of creating a
package-local environment in R/init.R or R/zzz.R. I then fill it with

values

reflecting options() (often under a tag starting with the package name)
and/or environment variables, and sometime also provide 'setters' to

update

the environment values. That have proven to be both good enough and

rather

robust and, as an added benefit, does not depend on anything further.

Cheers, Dirk

--
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Rainer M. Krug, PhD (Conservation Ecology, SUN), MSc (Conservation
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