Rolf and Duncan
Many thanks. Your answers pointed me to a refinement that is closer to what I
want:
rm(list=intersect(ls(".GlobalEnv"),ls("package:reedgraph")),
pos=".GlobalEnv")
This only removes items that are "masked" by GlobalEnv from my package.
As this is a bit long for some of the people that need to update their
workspaces I have created a function to fix it:
<packagename>.update2package <- function() {
rm(list=intersect(ls(".GlobalEnv"),ls("package:<packagename>")),
pos=".GlobalEnv")
}
Just for completeness (if anyone else reads this). It is possible to make this
happen automatically at package load using
.onAttach <- function(libname, pkgname) { <packagename>.update2package() }
However, as Duncan says this is REALLY bad practice, but is useful to me while
debugging….
Duncan: you say avoid saving the workspace. While I can understand why you are
saying this, one of the really powerful features of R is the ability to start R
in a working directory and have the state saved so you can come back to it.
While this may be bad for the GUI versions of R as the workspace would just
keep growing, if you start it from a particular directory this is not a problem
and allows coming back to where you left off…
Regards,
Martin
On 8 Nov 2012, at 02:38, Rolf Turner <rolf.tur...@xtra.co.nz> wrote:
>
> Suggestions:
>
> (1) Work in a different directory (so that you will have a different ---
> initially
> empty) .RData file.
>
> (2) Or: Clean up the .Rdata file in the directory that you are currently
> using;
> rm(list=ls()) does this for you. Every so slightly dangerous! :-)
>
> (3) Possibly: Before doing (2), save stuff that you actually *want*, e.g. via
>
> save(mung,gorp,clyde,irving,melvin,file="savedStuff.rda")
>
> Then you can recover mung, gorp, etc. via
>
> load("savedStuff.rda")
>
> cheers,
>
> Rolf Turner
>
> On 08/11/12 13:11, Martin J Reed wrote:
>> Hi,
>>
>> I have a problem with a package I have developed in that functions do not
>> get loaded due to older versions of the functions being in the .GlobalEnv’
>> fetched from .Rdata files stored from previous saved workspaces. I need to
>> be able to fix this somehow when I load the package. I do not want to mess
>> up the search order to fix the problem.
>>
>> How I got myself into this mess is that I started developing using a bunch
>> of R files and a dynamic library and then loaded these from an R function
>> rather than a package. This is great when developing as it allows quick
>> reloading. After doing this for about a year now I have (unknowingly)
>> populated all my favourite working directories with .Rdata files that
>> contain various versions of my functions. And I shared this collection of
>> code, with its flakey loading mechanism, with PhD students and colleagues
>> who have used it and nicely populated their working directories with it as
>> well….
>>
>> So now I have learnt how to turn it into a package as it is in a more stable
>> state. But when I load it of course the .GlobalEnv with the definition from
>> old saved .Rdata files is first in the search order. I say "of course" but
>> tt has taken me a while to find this out. At first I thought I was going mad
>> as the old functions seemed to magically turn up even though I had updated
>> the package and checked that the new versions of the functions were the only
>> ones in the system (or so I thought)…
>>
>> My question is: how can I force a package to overwrite the "old" definitions
>> in the .GlobalEnv. If it cannot be done automatically it could be a user
>> triggered function. While developing I still want newer versions of
>> functions to take precedence in the .GlobalEnv over the package versions.
>> i.e. I do not want the package to be earlier in the search order than
>> .GlobalEnv (if this is even possible), I just want to be able to delete the
>> old definitions. I do not want to delete the .Rdata files as there is useful
>> state in them...
>>
>> Any help getting me out of this mess would be appreciated!
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