R devel - Sep 2020 - Rust bindings to nmath

Hello @R-devel

I needed some statistical functions for a project I was working on in
Rust, and I've used the R math library as a standalone solution. I
thought the R developers would be interested in the fact that their work
is being used elsewhere, and I also wanted to say thanks for some code I
do NOT want to have to write myself!

The "crate" (Rust's name for a package) is at 
https://lib.rs/crates/r_stats.

Best wishes
Richard Dodd

On 1 September 2020 at 13:01, Richard Dodd wrote:
| I needed some statistical functions for a project I was working on in
| Rust, and I've used the R math library as a standalone solution. I

That's its purpose as far as I can tell. We have provided it as a Debian
package alongside the "normal" R interpreter (and everything else)
"for
decades" too.

| thought the R developers would be interested in the fact that their work
| is being used elsewhere, and I also wanted to say thanks for some code I
| do NOT want to have to write myself!
| 
| The "crate" (Rust's name for a package) is at 
| https://lib.rs/crates/r_stats.

Nice.

Any chance you could rename it to a more neutral r_mathlib or something?
As a free-standing C library it has long been wrapped by other languages, but
if it were my project I'd be more careful to not imply "all of
stats" here.
FWIW in Debian we call it `r-mathlib`.

Dirk

-- 
https://dirk.eddelbuettel.com | @eddelbuettel | edd at debian.org

>>>>> Dirk Eddelbuettel 
>>>>>     on Tue, 1 Sep 2020 07:56:53 -0500 writes:
    > On 1 September 2020 at 13:01, Richard Dodd wrote:
    > | I needed some statistical functions for a project I was working on in
    > | Rust, and I've used the R math library as a standalone solution.
I

    > That's its purpose as far as I can tell. We have provided it as a
Debian
    > package alongside the "normal" R interpreter (and everything
else) "for
    > decades" too.

    > | thought the R developers would be interested in the fact that their
work
    > | is being used elsewhere, and I also wanted to say thanks for some
code I
    > | do NOT want to have to write myself!
    > | 
    > | The "crate" (Rust's name for a package) is at 
    > | https://lib.rs/crates/r_stats.

    > Nice.

Indeed.  Thank you for letting us know!

{BTW: There's been an ambitious project of binding all of
      mathlib *and more out of R*  to a java script library;
 But I think that project has taken the typical course of
 the majority of github projects:  "code rut"}
      
    > Any chance you could rename it to a more neutral r_mathlib or
something?
    > As a free-standing C library it has long been wrapped by other
languages, but
    > if it were my project I'd be more careful to not imply "all of
stats" here.
    > FWIW in Debian we call it `r-mathlib`.

    > Dirk
    > -- 
    > https://dirk.eddelbuettel.com | @eddelbuettel | edd at debian.org

As one of the main coders or rather tweakers of its source code,
I strongly agree with Dirk  that 'r_stats' is really misleading here.
>From an R point of view,  'math library' has been a good name,
notably because there's a lot of applied math routines in there,
99% related to (applied) probability which is part of math.

If 'Rust' and other re-implementors think they must add
"stat(s)" somewhere --- which is understandable, since the
"applied math" mentioned above is almost exclusively applied to
functions important in probability and statistics ---
I'd propose something like
    " r_stats_math "

Martin M?chler
ETH Zurich  and  R Core team

--
Martin <Maechler at stat.math.ethz.ch>   http://stat.ethz.ch/~maechler
Seminar f?r Statistik, ETH Z?rich     HG G 16       R?mistrasse 101
CH-8092 Zurich, SWITZERLAND           ? +41 44 632 3408        <><