> The CRAN guidelines should be rewritten so that they say what they *mean*. > If a complete sentence is not actually required --- and it seemsabundantly clear> that it is not --- then guidelines should not say so. Rather they shouldsay,> clearly and comprehensibly, what actually *is* required.This may be true, but also think of the user when you write the description. If you are scanning a long list of descriptions looking for a package to use, seeing a description that starts with 'A package for' just slows you down. Seeing a description that includes 'designed to' leaves you wondering if the implementation is woefully incomplete. You want to go beyond what CRAN can test for. Bill Dunlap TIBCO Software wdunlap tibco.com On Fri, Jul 3, 2015 at 3:26 PM, Rolf Turner <r.turner at auckland.ac.nz> wrote:> On 04/07/15 06:27, Yihui Xie wrote: > >> Sigh, how natural it is to say "This package ...", but you probably >> don't know a package can be easily rejected by CRAN simply because of >> this phrase "This package" (it has been clearly stated in the R-exts >> manual). >> > > Urrrkkkk! I *did* "know" that, but had forgotten. Apologies for my > wrong-headed suggestion. Thanks for pointing out my error. > > I don't think the grammar is the problem here. When in doubt, I always >> check what MASS does: >> http://cran.rstudio.com/web/packages/MASS/index.html Turns out its >> description is not a complete sentence, either. >> >> Sounds like R has become a language for statistical computing and >> graphics, plus English grammar since 3.0.x. >> > > The CRAN guidelines should be rewritten so that they say what they > *mean*. If a complete sentence is not actually required --- and it seems > abundantly clear that it is not --- then guidelines should not say so. > Rather they should say, clearly and comprehensibly, what actually *is* > required. > > > cheers, > > Rolf Turner > > -- > Technical Editor ANZJS > Department of Statistics > University of Auckland > Phone: +64-9-373-7599 ext. 88276 > > ______________________________________________ > R-help at r-project.org mailing list -- To UNSUBSCRIBE and more, see > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help > PLEASE do read the posting guide > http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html > and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. >[[alternative HTML version deleted]]
On 07/07/15 07:10, William Dunlap wrote: [Rolf Turner wrote.]>> The CRAN guidelines should be rewritten so that they say what they *mean*. >> If a complete sentence is not actually required --- and it seems abundantly clear >> that it is not --- then guidelines should not say so. Rather they should say, >> clearly and comprehensibly, what actually *is* required. > > This may be true, but also think of the user when you write the description. > If you are scanning a long list of descriptions looking for a package to > use, > seeing a description that starts with 'A package for' just slows you down. > Seeing a description that includes 'designed to' leaves you wondering if the > implementation is woefully incomplete. You want to go beyond what CRAN > can test for.All very true and sound and wise, but what has this got to do with complete sentences? The package checker issues a message saying that it wants a complete sentence when this has nothing to do with what it *really* wants. cheers, Rolf -- Technical Editor ANZJS Department of Statistics University of Auckland Phone: +64-9-373-7599 ext. 88276
On 06/07/2015 5:09 PM, Rolf Turner wrote:> On 07/07/15 07:10, William Dunlap wrote: > > [Rolf Turner wrote.] > >>> The CRAN guidelines should be rewritten so that they say what they *mean*. >>> If a complete sentence is not actually required --- and it seems abundantly clear >>> that it is not --- then guidelines should not say so. Rather they should say, >>> clearly and comprehensibly, what actually *is* required. >> >> This may be true, but also think of the user when you write the description. >> If you are scanning a long list of descriptions looking for a package to >> use, >> seeing a description that starts with 'A package for' just slows you down. >> Seeing a description that includes 'designed to' leaves you wondering if the >> implementation is woefully incomplete. You want to go beyond what CRAN >> can test for. > > All very true and sound and wise, but what has this got to do with > complete sentences? The package checker issues a message saying that it > wants a complete sentence when this has nothing to do with what it > *really* wants.That's false. If you haven't given a complete sentence, you might still pass, but if you have, you will pass. That's not "nothing to do" with what it really wants, it's just an imperfect test that fails to detect violations of the guidelines. As we've seen, it sometimes also makes mistakes in the other direction. I'd say those are more serious. Duncan Murdoch