I received a request that I remove the 'plyr' package from the Imports for my
package, because plyr is retired. Indeed, the README file for plyr states:
> plyr is retired: this means only changes necessary to keep it on CRAN
will be made.
> We recommend using dplyr (for data frames) or purrr (for lists) instead.
This says "retired" but it also suggests that plyr will continue to be
maintained. And that is a good thing because plyr has over 700 direct
reverse-dependents, and almost 2000 if we include indirect reverse
dependencies.
So it seems to me that it isn't a problem at all to have my package import
plyr. I use its 'aaply' and 'alply' functions, which are like 'apply' but work
for any dimensional array. There are no obvious replacements in purrr or dplyr,
and if there were and I used them instead, it would increase my indirect
dependencies to several packages that are not actually needed.
The user requesting that I drop plyr states that this is needed to satisfy
regulatory needs, that it is problematic to qualify my package since it imports
a retired package.
So my question is: Is there a specific meaning in CRAN for "retired," or is
that just loose language from the plyr developers? I did not find the term in
"CRAN Repository Policy" or "Writing R Extensions." It appears that my user or
their regulatory agency thinks it means that it could be deprecated in the near
future. (If that is indeed what it means, there are 700+ packages in trouble!)
Otherwise, perhaps the appropriate request may be to the plyr maintainers to
modify how they describe its status, so as to avoid confusion.
Russ Lenth
University of Iowa
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