Installation and use

Introduction

This package contains data sets used in the code examples in the book “Learn R: As a Language” by Pedro J. Aphalo, available at https://leanpub.com/learnr. The book uses mostly data sets included in the R distribution itself and in packages available through CRAN, so few additional data sets are included as R data in this package. However, to demonstrate the reading of foreign data formats I use in the book several files. These files are part of this package and installed in the extdata folder.

From the book’s backcover

Learning a computer language like R can be either frustrating, fun or boring. Having fun requires challenges that wake up the learner’s curiosity but also provide an emotional reward on overcoming them. The book is designed so that it includes smaller and bigger challenges, in what I call playgrounds, in the hope that all readers will enjoy their path to R fluency. Fluency in the use of a language is a skill that is acquired through practice and exploration. Although rarely mentioned separately, fluency in a computer programming language involves both writing and reading. The parallels between natural and computer languages are many but differences are also important. For students and professionals in the biological sciences, humanities and many applied fields, recognizing the parallels between R and natural languages should help them feel at home with R. The approach I use is similar to that of a travel guide, encouraging exploration and describing the available alternatives and how to reach them. The intention is to guide the reader through the R landscape of 2020 and beyond.

Installation of this package

Installation of the package itself is not different to that of any other package available through CRAN.

install.packages("learnrbook")

Loading the package

library(learnrbook)

Installation of packages used in the book

In the code examples in the book I use several packages available from CRAN. They are loaded in a code chunk at the start of chapters 6, 7, and 8, where they are used. To facilitate their installation and use, vectors containing package names are provided.

To install all the packages used in the book you can use.

install.packages(learnrbook::pkgs_all)

If you rather install only the packages used in a given chapter, for example, chapter 7 on the Grammar of Graphics it is possible to install only these.

install.packages(learnrbook::pkgs_ch_graphics)

To install only the packages that are missing.

intalled_pkgs <- installed.packages()[ , 1]
missing_pkgs <- setdiff(learnrbook::pkgs_all, intalled_pkgs)
if (length(missing_pkgs) > 0) {
 install.packages(missing_pkgs)
}

Use of R data objects

Please, see the individual help pages for additional details on the data sets.

help(package = "learnrbook")

data(package = "learnrbook")

Display the top six rows.

head(viikki_d29.dat)

##            solar_time WindDir_D1_WVT WindSpd_S_WVT
## 1 2016-07-29 00:00:27         64.680         0.767
## 2 2016-07-29 00:01:27         22.660         0.733
## 3 2016-07-29 00:02:27          7.946         1.142
## 4 2016-07-29 00:03:27         19.320         1.333
## 5 2016-07-29 00:04:27        348.700         1.033
## 6 2016-07-29 00:05:27        323.000         0.967

Use of examples files

Example files are installed in folder extdata under the root folder of the installed package. The location and path to where a package is installed is dependent on the operating system and account settings, and on the settings in the .Rprofile file. However, R provides a simple way of finding the path to this folder.

system.file("extdata", package = "learnrbook")

We can also easily get a list of the available example files.

path2examples <- system.file("extdata", package = "learnrbook")
list.files(path2examples)

##  [1] "BIRCH1.SYS"                   "Book1.ods"                   
##  [3] "Book1.xlsx"                   "GPSDATA-large.gpx"           
##  [5] "GPSDATA.gpx"                  "aligned-ASCII-UK.csv"        
##  [7] "aligned-ASCII.fwf"            "aligned-ASCII.txt"           
##  [9] "areatable.dat"                "cloudindex.idx"              
## [11] "dwtable.dat"                  "logger_1.txt"                
## [13] "meteo-data.nc"                "miss-aligned-ASCII-shift.txt"
## [15] "miss-aligned-ASCII.txt"       "my-data.sav"                 
## [17] "my-data.xlsx"                 "my-file.csv"                 
## [19] "my-file1.csv"                 "my-file2.csv"                
## [21] "my-file2.txt"                 "my-file3.txt"                
## [23] "my-file4.txt"                 "my-file5.tsv"                
## [25] "my-file5.txt"                 "my-file6.csv"                
## [27] "my-file7.txt"                 "my-script.R"                 
## [29] "not-aligned-ASCII-UK.csv"     "not-aligned-ASCII.txt"       
## [31] "pet_ltm.nc"                   "pevpr.sfc.mon.ltm.nc"        
## [33] "rcatsidx.idx"                 "rindex.idx"                  
## [35] "thiamin.sav"                  "using-r-main-crc.idx"

The formats of these files are:

Most data files are used in Chapter 8 Data Input and Output.

The example R script is used in Chapter 3 The R language: “Paragraphs” and “essays”

The sources of the data in these files, and a short descriptions of the data follows for those files that contain real data.