[R] Setting .Rprofile for RStudio on a Windows 7 x64bit

Rolf Turner
2017-04-16T22:08:26Z

On 17/04/17 08:46, John C Frain wrote:

> Bruce
>
> The official documentation for these startup files can be obtained with
> the command
>
> Help(Startup)


Minor point of order, Mr. Chairman.  That should be:

     help(Startup)

There is (as far as I know) no such function as "Help()".  It is
important to remember that R is case sensitive.

Another point that is worthy of thought is "How in God's name would any
beginner know or find out about the usage help(Startup)?"  Unless they
were explicitly told about it, in the manner which you just
demonstrated.  The usage gets a mention in "An Introduction to R" ---
but I had to search for it.

To me the word "startup" is not terribly intuitive.  I would tend to
search for "starting" rather than "startup", I think, but
I'm not sure
what the average beginner would search for.  A search of "An
Introduction to R" for "starting" gets seven or eight hits, one
of which
is relevant.  So it all takes patience and persistence.

Also note that "An Introduction to R" mostly uses the word
"startup"
(lower case "s") and only uses "Startup" twice.  Note also
that

     help(startup)

fails.  You have to get that initial "S" right.

This isn't a criticism of the documentation.  I'm just pointing out that
there are problems, mostly insoluble.  Until some clever Johnny gets on
with developing that mind_read() function referred to in fortune(182).

cheers,

Rolf Turner

--
Technical Editor ANZJS
Department of Statistics
University of Auckland
Phone: +64-9-373-7599 ext. 88276