On 07/01/2010 2:58 PM, Kevin Wright wrote:
On Thu, Jan 7, 2010 at 9:32 AM, Duncan Murdoch <murd...@stats.uwo.ca> wrote:> On 07/01/2010 10:00 AM, Michal Kulich wrote: > >> On 7.1.2010 15:52, Duncan Murdoch wrote: >> > Not necessarily. The current help system can display information about >> > the current session, e.g. the result of ls(), as a simple example. But >> > if you use a single background session you won't get relevant >> information. >> > > Duncan Murdoch >> >> Sorry, I must admit I don't get it. >> >> >> > A more useful example than ls() would be methods(). I think it would be > nice to have a list of methods included in the man page for a generic > function, and links to their pages if they have their own man pages. You > might want to list all installed methods, with some sort of highlighting to > indicate which ones are already attached, or perhaps be able to toggle > between installed and attached, or whatever. None of that is possible with > static help, not even a list of installed methods, because someone might > install a new package that offers some others after the static help has > already been built. > You just need to use some imagination. > OK, I'll try imagining this approach: - Static help pages are installed with R. - install.packages() launches a subroutine to fix the \link references that need updating. Uninstalling needs to do the same. (Busywork, but that's why we have computers.) - I have an R object "foo". I type ShowMeAllMethodsFor("foo", installed=TRUE, attached=TRUE) which checks all installed packages and attached packages for appropriate methods, then serves up a dynamic help page with links to the relevant static help pages, color-coded by installed/attached.
I don't like the fragmentation of the R help system. This just produces yet another set of pages which are not reachable from anywhere but one place.
The help system should be a network of pages which are all interconnected. I should be able to click on something in the ?plot page and get to the ?plot.formula page (which I can do now, based on a static link) or the ?plot.foo page (which hasn't been written yet, but will be by the time I look at ?plot).
Duncan Murdoch ______________________________________________ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
