Hi All,
When I teach an intro workshop on R, I've been minimizing "quote confusion" by
always using quotes around package names in function calls. For example:
install.packages("Hmisc")
update.packages("Hmisc")
library("Hmisc")
citation("Hmisc")
search() # displays package names in quotes
detach("packages:Hmisc") # just as search displayed it
all look consistent with quotes. They're optional, of course, with library and
detach and I tell them that. But for beginners, it's hard to remember when they
don't need quotes. This perspective continues with function names in help:
help("mean")
?"mean"
help("if")
?"if"
which avoids the fact that some important topics like control-flow words (e.g.
help(if) ) generate error messages without the quotes. For help, the quotes
make the string a "topic" instead of a name, but that doesn't seem to block it
from finding function names in quotes.
I'm about to go to press with the second edition of R for SAS and SPSS Users &
I'm wondering if there's a downside to this. No other books I've seen use
library("package") or help("function") consistently. Is there a reason I should
avoid it?
Thanks,
Bob
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Bob Muenchen (pronounced Min'-chen), Manager
Research Computing Support
Voice: (865) 974-5230
Email: muenc...@utk.edu
Web: http://oit.utk.edu/research,
News: http://oit.utk.edu/research/news.php
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