R help - May 2000 - attach (S-style)?

Hi everyone,

Being new to the crowd of R users I am wondering what the equivalent of  

attach("/home/bla/hoffmann/R/.RData",2) 

 (S style) is in R.

What I want is a split of .RData repositories. One in a central place where I
keep functions and interesting stuff important for all work I am doing, an
several others which contain stuff of an dividual project only. When I start in
a project directory I want to make available the central stuff. If I do it like
in S+ I am getting and rightly so:

Error in attach("/home/woodstock/hoffmann/R/.RData", 2) : 
	attach only works for lists and data frames

What is the trick to use in R?

Thanks for your help.
--Christian

Christian W. Hoffmann
Mathematics and Statistical Computing
Landscape Modeling and Web Applications
Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research
CH-8903 Birmensdorf, Switzerland
phone: ++41-1-739 22 77    fax  : ++41-1-737 40 80 or  ++41-1-739 2215  e-mail:
Hoffmann at WSL.CH

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>>>>> "ChHo" == Christian Hoffmann
<christian.hoffmann at wsl.ch> writes:
    ChHo> Hi everyone, Being new to the crowd of R users I am wondering
    ChHo> what the equivalent of

    ChHo>      attach("/home/bla/hoffmann/R/.RData",2) 

    ChHo> (S style) is in R.

    ChHo> What I want is a split of .RData repositories. One in a central
    ChHo> place where I keep functions and interesting stuff important for
    ChHo> all work I am doing, an several others which contain stuff of an
    ChHo> dividual project only. When I start in a project directory I want
    ChHo> to make available the central stuff. If I do it like in S+ I am
    ChHo> getting and rightly so:

    ChHo> Error in attach("/home/woodstock/hoffmann/R/.RData", 2) :
    ChHo> attach only works for lists and data frames

    ChHo> What is the trick to use in R?

You use packages [via library()] ==>  help(library) and help(INSTALL)
				 and the "Writing R Extensions" Manual
and then you can add a
    library(my.important.stuff)
to a local or a site-wide  Rprofile file such that it is 
automatically there.

If you really want to get at the content of .RData (binary) files,
you use load(.), but this adds the objects to your ".GlobalEnv"
i.e.,  search()[1].
If you want be even smarter, you can look how the library() command
"does it" and probably do the same, using  load() instead of
[sys.]source().

But anyway, as said initially : Using packages is what you should do ...

On creating your own packages, the R-FAQ says
>>    See section "Creating R packages" in `Writing R
Extensions'', for details.
>> This manual is included in the R distribution, *note What documentation
>> exists for R?::, and gives information on package structure, the
configure
>> and cleanup mechanisms, and on automated package checking and building.
---

I hope this helps to get you started.

Martin Maechler <maechler at stat.math.ethz.ch>
http://stat.ethz.ch/~maechler/
Seminar fuer Statistik, ETH-Zentrum  LEO D10	Leonhardstr. 27
ETH (Federal Inst. Technology)	8092 Zurich	SWITZERLAND
phone: x-41-1-632-3408		fax: ...-1228			<><
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On Thu, 18 May 2000, Martin Maechler wrote:
> >>>>> "ChHo" == Christian Hoffmann
<christian.hoffmann at wsl.ch> writes:
> 
>     ChHo> Hi everyone, Being new to the crowd of R users I am wondering
>     ChHo> what the equivalent of
> 
>     ChHo>      attach("/home/bla/hoffmann/R/.RData",2) 
> 
>     ChHo> (S style) is in R.
While the best way to do this is usually with load() or by creating a
package, you will be able to do this in R 1.1.0

The way it is implemented is basically

	attach(NULL,2)
	load("/home/bla/hoffmann/R/.RData",envir=pos.to.env(2))



   -thomas

Thomas Lumley
Assistant Professor, Biostatistics
University of Washington, Seattle

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