A little while ago here we had a short discussion about Task Views - I think ignited by someone saying 'how many times do I have to say "have you read the Optimisation Task View?"?' and I poured some fuel on that fire by saying "Task Views" was a stupid name. Anyway, I did say that Task Views were rather brilliant, but were let down by their hidden position on the R web sites (tucked away as the third element of a sub-menu of a CRAN mirror site linked to by the CRAN link from the Download menu on the main R home page). The index page is rather plain, so I designed a more engaging one. The result of my effort is now here: http://www.maths.lancs.ac.uk/~rowlings/R/TaskViews/ Having done that, I even considered that something like that could replace the R Homepage. Giving new visitors an idea of the vast range of techniques and application areas available in R would seem to be better than the current graphic which has been there since perhaps 2004. Comments, thoughts, flames, etc? Barry
On 21-02-2012, at 13:58, Barry Rowlingson wrote:> A little while ago here we had a short discussion about Task Views - I > think ignited by someone saying 'how many times do I have to say "have > you read the Optimisation Task View?"?' and I poured some fuel on that > fire by saying "Task Views" was a stupid name. > > Anyway, I did say that Task Views were rather brilliant, but were let > down by their hidden position on the R web sites (tucked away as the > third element of a sub-menu of a CRAN mirror site linked to by the > CRAN link from the Download menu on the main R home page). The index > page is rather plain, so I designed a more engaging one. The result of > my effort is now here: > > http://www.maths.lancs.ac.uk/~rowlings/R/TaskViews/ > > Having done that, I even considered that something like that could > replace the R Homepage. Giving new visitors an idea of the vast range > of techniques and application areas available in R would seem to be > better than the current graphic which has been there since perhaps > 2004. > > Comments, thoughts, flames, etc?Looks really nice. I think you did a very good job. Two suggestions: 1. make each image the same hight. 2. make each box the same height and width. Would be more restful to the eyes. It's a bit chaotic now. Something similar for the R home page would be very nice. Berend
Barry Rowlingson <b.rowlingson <at> lancaster.ac.uk> writes:> Anyway, I did say that Task Views were rather brilliant, but were let > down by their hidden position on the R web sites (tucked away as the > third element of a sub-menu of a CRAN mirror site linked to by the > CRAN link from the Download menu on the main R home page). The index > page is rather plain, so I designed a more engaging one. The result of > my effort is now here: > > http://www.maths.lancs.ac.uk/~rowlings/R/TaskViews/ > > Having done that, I even considered that something like that could > replace the R Homepage. Giving new visitors an idea of the vast range > of techniques and application areas available in R would seem to be > better than the current graphic which has been there since perhaps > 2004.I love it. The only problem I have with it is that it's a little harder to grasp the whole list since the titles of the individual task views are now so spread out. What is it about Bayesian statistics and elephants? (Clark's book on Bayesian models for ecology also has an elephant.) Is it the elephant in the room no-one will talk about? Or is it the "give me four parameters and I'll draw you an elephant" thing?
Barry, thanks for the ideas and the suggestion of a more interesting title page for the task views. Just a few comments from me as the person coordinating the task views on CRAN: o The design of CRAN task view presentation/installation was chosen to be parallel to CRAN package presentation/installation. In particular, the task views are mirrored with the rest of CRAN and all links refer to the locally available package pages. Also, installation can be done from any repository. o While this is good for distributing web services, it limits the possibilities in terms of web design. In think that the CRAN maintainers do not use Javascript, for example. o Personally, I like the images used but I could imagine that some maintainers would prefer different pictures (e.g., a different visualization of a posterior for the Bayesian task view). But if the maintainers choose the images, it would be harder to assure a consistent design, I guess. So there are some practical caveats when implementing such an approach. Certainly nothing insurmountable but maybe not very straightforward either. In any case, I will keep the "ctv" tools in sync with the general approach taken by CRAN. Best, Z On Tue, 21 Feb 2012, Barry Rowlingson wrote:> A little while ago here we had a short discussion about Task Views - I > think ignited by someone saying 'how many times do I have to say "have > you read the Optimisation Task View?"?' and I poured some fuel on that > fire by saying "Task Views" was a stupid name. > > Anyway, I did say that Task Views were rather brilliant, but were let > down by their hidden position on the R web sites (tucked away as the > third element of a sub-menu of a CRAN mirror site linked to by the > CRAN link from the Download menu on the main R home page). The index > page is rather plain, so I designed a more engaging one. The result of > my effort is now here: > > http://www.maths.lancs.ac.uk/~rowlings/R/TaskViews/ > > Having done that, I even considered that something like that could > replace the R Homepage. Giving new visitors an idea of the vast range > of techniques and application areas available in R would seem to be > better than the current graphic which has been there since perhaps > 2004. > > Comments, thoughts, flames, etc? > > Barry > > ______________________________________________ > R-devel at r-project.org mailing list > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel >
> Anyway, I did say that Task Views were rather brilliant, but were let > down by their hidden position on the R web sites (tucked away as the > third element of a sub-menu of a CRAN mirror site linked to by the > CRAN link from the Download menu on the main R home page). The index > page is rather plain, so I designed a more engaging one. The result of > my effort is now here: > > http://www.maths.lancs.ac.uk/~rowlings/R/TaskViews/ > > Having done that, I even considered that something like that could > replace the R Homepage. Giving new visitors an idea of the vast range > of techniques and application areas available in R would seem to be > better than the current graphic which has been there since perhaps > 2004. > > Comments, thoughts, flames, etc?I think it would be more appealing if you used the same sized image for each category. (And at least you should provide width and height attributes so layout can complete before the images are loaded) You might also want to consider using something like http://twitter.github.com/bootstrap/ for nicer default font sizes etc. Hadley -- Assistant Professor / Dobelman Family Junior Chair Department of Statistics / Rice University http://had.co.nz/
Regardless of the page's other merits (looks nice to me), I did enjoy seeing my favorite teacher's (Dev Basu's) elephant in the Bayesian box. Thanks for that.
Hi, In a way, a simple text based system is clean and is consistent with the plain text requirements of the listservs, and interacting with R through code/text. However, for people with different backgrounds, it can seem unappealing. I definitely believe your page is more inviting. I work at a campus statistical consulting center and we are seeing a substantial increase in researchers and grad students using R. We only recently began supporting R, and one thing I have noticed in both clients and other consultants relatively unfamiliar with R is that they often seem to not look beyond the core. In my opinion, this is partly responsible for the belief that R is difficult to use or that task X is easier to do in program Y than in R. I believe that better marketing and navigability of the task views (which themselves are excellent lists of packages relevant to particular disciplines or applications) can help this perception. Barry, is this a test/example only or would you plan on keeping something like that on your site even if it is not adopted for cran task views? If it is not adopted elsewhere and you are willing to maintain it, I would like to link to it. Very nice work! Cheers, Josh On Tue, Feb 21, 2012 at 4:58 AM, Barry Rowlingson <b.rowlingson at lancaster.ac.uk> wrote:> A little while ago here we had a short discussion about Task Views - I > think ignited by someone saying 'how many times do I have to say "have > you read the Optimisation Task View?"?' and I poured some fuel on that > fire by saying "Task Views" was a stupid name. > > Anyway, I did say that Task Views were rather brilliant, but were let > down by their hidden position on the R web sites (tucked away as the > third element of a sub-menu of a CRAN mirror site linked to by the > CRAN link from the Download menu on the main R home page). The index > page is rather plain, so I designed a more engaging one. The result of > my effort is now here: > > http://www.maths.lancs.ac.uk/~rowlings/R/TaskViews/ > > Having done that, I even considered that something like that could > replace the R Homepage. Giving new visitors an idea of the vast range > of techniques and application areas available in R would seem to be > better than the current graphic which has been there since perhaps > 2004. > > Comments, thoughts, flames, etc? > > Barry > > ______________________________________________ > R-devel at r-project.org mailing list > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel-- Joshua Wiley Ph.D. Student, Health Psychology Programmer Analyst II, Statistical Consulting Group University of California, Los Angeles https://joshuawiley.com/