R help - Feb 2004 - calling R from a shell script and have it display graphics

Hello,

I am running R under Linux/x11.

I would like to call R from a shell script and have it display a series 
of graphics.
The graphics should remain visible until the user clicks or presses a key.

I first tried R BATCH, but it does not load the x11 module, making it 
impossible to open x11 or png devices.

Then, I tried to call R with a 'here' script:

R --vanilla --quiet --args text.txt <<'EOF'
file=commandArgs()[5]
cat('processing ',file,'\n')
...
x11()
plot(f2,log='xy',type='b',las=1,cex=.5,xlab='rang',ylab='freq')
Sys.sleep(10)
q()
EOF

The problem with this approach is that the script cannot interact with 
the user.
par(ask=T) will fail because it reads input from the script rather than 
from the keyboard.

While I am writing this, a solution comes to my mind: I could save all 
the graphics in png format (using R <script.R), and when it is finished, 
call ImageMagick's display to show all the png (or use any other 
diaporama system). However, I find it a dirty hack.

Is there a simpler and cleaner way to achieve this?

Christophe Pallier
www.pallier.org

I don't know about the "simpler" part, but you could use the tcltk
package to put up a window that prompts the user to continue.

-Don


At 11:57 AM +0100 2/12/04, Christophe Pallier wrote:
>Hello,
>
>I am running R under Linux/x11.
>
>I would like to call R from a shell script and have it display a 
>series of graphics.
>The graphics should remain visible until the user clicks or presses a key.
>
>I first tried R BATCH, but it does not load the x11 module, making 
>it impossible to open x11 or png devices.
>
>Then, I tried to call R with a 'here' script:
>
>R --vanilla --quiet --args text.txt <<'EOF'
>file=commandArgs()[5]
>cat('processing ',file,'\n')
>...
>x11()
>plot(f2,log='xy',type='b',las=1,cex=.5,xlab='rang',ylab='freq')
>Sys.sleep(10)
>q()
>EOF
>
>The problem with this approach is that the script cannot interact 
>with the user.
>par(ask=T) will fail because it reads input from the script rather 
>than from the keyboard.
>
>While I am writing this, a solution comes to my mind: I could save 
>all the graphics in png format (using R <script.R), and when it is 
>finished, call ImageMagick's display to show all the png (or use any 
>other diaporama system). However, I find it a dirty hack.
>
>Is there a simpler and cleaner way to achieve this?
>
>Christophe Pallier
>www.pallier.org
>
>______________________________________________
>R-help at stat.math.ethz.ch mailing list
>https://www.stat.math.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help
>PLEASE do read the posting guide!
http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html

-- 
--------------------------------------
Don MacQueen
Environmental Protection Department
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
Livermore, CA, USA

Christophe Pallier <pallier at lscp.ehess.fr>
wrote:
> I would like to call R from a shell script and have it display a series 
> of graphics.
> The graphics should remain visible until the user clicks or presses a key.
One trick is to use locator(1), which waits for a mouse click on a plot.
Here's a minimal Perl script that runs R, displays a plot, and exits when
the
click is detected.


eval 'exec /usr/local/bin/perl -s -S $0 "$@"'
  if 0;
open(SCRIPT, "| R --vanilla --slave");
print SCRIPT <<'EOF';

x11(width=5, height=3.5)
plot(1:10, 1:10)
z <- locator(1)
q()

EOF
close(SCRIPT);

-- 
                              -- David Brahm (brahm at alum.mit.edu)