Tag Archives: R software

Recommended: Accessible R Markdown Documents

This page is moving to a new website.

A class covering on-line teaching has reminded me about accessibility issues. This includes accessibility for blind students who rely on screen readers. This webpage post covers some of the very simple things you can do that would make life a lot easier for students with impaired vision. Continue reading

Recommended: r2d3: R Interface to D3 Visualizations

This page is moving to a new website.

There’s an interesting visualization system called d3, that I only became aware of a few months ago. It uses a fairly minimal system, javascript and support vector graphics, but is capable of producing tremendously rich graphics. I’ve tried, when I have a few spare moments, to learn d3. It’s not that complicated, but I am hindered by a lack of knowledge about javascript. It’s also difficult to debug a d3 program. There’s a new library in R that should make things a bit easier for someone like me. It’s called r2d3 and is being promoted with the new preview release of RStudio. Continue reading

Recommended: TinyTeX: A lightweight, cross-platform, portable, and easy-to-maintain LaTeX distribution based on TeX Live

This page is moving to a new website.

I’ve been using a version of LaTeX (MikTeX) for a couple of years, and it’s not bad. But when I heard about Yihui Xie’s R package, tinytex, I jumped at the opportunity to try it. Dr. Xie is the author of knitr, a package that makes it easy to create well documented R programs where the code and the output are gracefully merged. He created this new package, tinytex, because he felt that the current versions of LaTex had complex installation processes and forced you to choose between a minimal installation that couldn’t do anything useful and a full installation that was bloated with features you’d never use. I can’t say too much about the package yet except that he is right in that it is very easy to install. If I find out more, I’ll let you know. Continue reading

PMean: Recommended format for homework assignments

This page is moving to a new website.

I’m teaching a couple of classes, Introduction to R and Introduction to SAS, and I’m finding that students will turn in homework a variety of different ways. I’m fine with this up to a point, but I think that I should encourage a simple uniform approach, because out in the real world, your boss or your clients will not appreciate a haphazard and disorganized approach. Here’s a suggested format for homework assignments that will (hopefully) get you in the practice of turning into things in an organized fashion. Continue reading