R devel - Feb 2004 - Rejoinder: request for comments --- package "distr" --- S4 Classes for Distributions

Hello,

this is kind of a rejoinder to our posting to r-devel
"request for comments --- package "distr" --- S4 Classes for
Distributions"
dating from 01-31-04/ 05:11:50 EST./

To start, we want to thank the contributors of comments and suggestions,
which have been quite helpful to us.

Also, we want to apologize for being somewhat lengthy in our replies;
we hope you could cope with this.

Some specific questions emerged from this discussion:

(1) Naming of "private" slots: 
We agree with a proposal by Duncan Murdoch
[off-list] to use longer names in order to inhibit misuse of the @-operator

(2) Naming of the accesors r,d,p,q:
We tentatively would keep our naming as it makes apparent their origin.

(3) Question of functions as slots:
We hope to have convinced you that our solution has some advantages
in connection with transformations of distributions.

(4) Redundant saving of values of slots
(in case of the parameter of  a distribution --- a topic mentioned
by Duncan Murdoch [off-list]):

YES we do have some redundant saving of values.
BUT if inspection / modification of slots is done only by accessor/
replacement functions we take care of consistency.
We admit a certain inefficiency in that we replace the whole object
(including the validity check) when modifying parameter slots;
--- it just seemed much easier to realize and on the other hand, as
no too large structures are part of a distribution object, we see
this inefficiency only as a minor disadvantage.

(5) Multivariate distributions
They could easily be included to our package, but haven't been yet
--- we simply do not consider ourselves experts enough to do this job.

It would be nice if you could let us know your opinion / some suggestions
to these issues.

Thank you once again for your attention.

Peter Ruckdeschel, Matthias Kohl,
Thomas Stabla, Florian Camphausen.
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The http-reference for package "distr"

           http://www.uni-bayreuth.de/departments/math/org/mathe7/DISTR/
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