SetGeneric and formula interfaces

Torsten Hothorn
2002-07-01T10:17:31Z

Hi,

while playing with the `methods' package I was not able to find what the
recommended way of dealing with the following problem is.

Suppose there is a generic function `foo' and two functions
`foo.default'
and `foo.formula', in the classical way:

foo <- function(y, ...) UseMethod("foo")

foo.default <- function(y, ...) {}

foo.formula <- function(formula, data, subset, na.action, ...) {
 ...
 do.call("foo", y=something appropriate,...)
}

If I recall it correctly, foo.formula is the only function that is allowed
to have different arguments than the generic function has (at least by R
CMD check).

Now, using `setGeneric' and `setMethod':

R> library(methods)
R>
R> setGeneric("foo", function(y, ...)
standardGeneric("foo"))
[1] "foo"
R>
R> setMethod("foo", signature(y="numeric"),
+ function(y, ...) print("foo with numeric"))
[1] "foo"
R>
R> setMethod("foo", signature(y="formula"),
+ function(y, ...) print("foo with formula"))
[1] "foo"
R>
R> foo(x ~ a)
[1] "foo with formula"
R> foo(1:10)
[1] "foo with numeric"

fine. But is it possible to have a method that has an argument `formula'
instead of `y', at least for the sake of compatibility with the classical
way?

Torsten

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