Re: [R-pkg-devel] Inquiry Regarding Package Organization in CRAN

2024-01-20 Thread Jeroen Ooms 
On Fri, Jan 19, 2024 at 8:41 PM Protsak Andriy via R-package-devel
 wrote:
>
> Hi all!
>
>
>
> My name is Andriy, and I’m a student at University of Alcalá, currently 
> working on my final year project.
>
>
>
> I’m tasked with organizing the R packages developed by our university that 
> are currently available on CRAN. The goal is to enhance their 
> discoverability, to achieve this the initial focus is on exploring the 
> possibility of renaming the packages so that they share a common prefix, 
> making it easier for uses to locate them in the package list.
>
> If you believe there are alternative strategies to achieve a similar result, 
> please feel free to share your perspective.



You could also set up a cranlike package repository on r-universe,
where you include all the packages from your university (both those
from CRAN and others). This will provide a nice overview of all the
packages in your institute and makes them discoverable via web UI and
r-universe search engine.

Many other organisations are represented here as well, some examples:

 - https://ropensci.r-universe.dev
 - https://lcbc-uio.r-universe.dev
 - https://vimc.r-universe.dev
 - https://kwb-r.r-universe.dev
 - https://mrcieu.r-universe.dev
 - https://inbo.r-universe.dev

And many more from: https://r-universe.dev/organizations/. Getting
started is easy, see:
https://github.com/r-universe-org/help?tab=readme-ov-file

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Re: [R-pkg-devel] Inquiry Regarding Package Organization in CRAN

2024-01-20 Thread Michael Dewey 

Dear Andriy

I would second the advice that David and Ivan have already given.

I woouls also add that I suspect that most users search for packages by 
functionality so you might want to study techniques for search engine 
optimisation and then advise authors how to increase the visibility of 
their packages.


If the goal is just to record all package from your university then why 
not establish a page on your university website which links to all of 
them? The main problem there will be updating it after you have 
graduated and moved institutions.


Michael

On 19/01/2024 14:34, Protsak Andriy via R-package-devel wrote:

Hi all!



My name is Andriy, and I�m a student at University of Alcal�, currently working 
on my final year project.



I�m tasked with organizing the R packages developed by our university that are 
currently available on CRAN. The goal is to enhance their discoverability, to 
achieve this the initial focus is on exploring the possibility of renaming the 
packages so that they share a common prefix, making it easier for uses to 
locate them in the package list.

If you believe there are alternative strategies to achieve a similar result, 
please feel free to share your perspective.



Additionally, I�m looking into the prospect of merging two packages that 
contain similar functionalities. The aim is to create a more comprehensive 
package by incorporation additional features and ensuring seamless 
compatibility.



Your assistance is key to the successful completion of my final year project, 
and I would be immensely grateful for any insights you can provide. Thank you 
for your time and consideration.



Best regards,



Andriy

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--
Michael

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Re: [R-pkg-devel] Inquiry Regarding Package Organization in CRAN

2024-01-19 Thread Ivan Krylov via R-package-devel 
Hello Andriy and welcome to R-package-devel!

On Fri, 19 Jan 2024 14:34:25 +
Protsak Andriy via R-package-devel 
wrote:

> to achieve this the initial focus is on exploring the possibility of
> renaming the packages so that they share a common prefix, making it
> easier for uses to locate them in the package list.

CRAN package names are long-term identifiers. Assume that there are
many users happy with the packages as they are. If you rename a
package, they will have to patch their scripts and their own packages
just to keep them working as before. Red Queen's race is not something
people like to participate in.

It is certainly not impossible to rename a package, but there has to be
a very good reason to break backwards compatibility and assume a new
name, while the old name stays in the archive, unavailable for new
packages.

Here are some past responses to similar questions:

https://stat.ethz.ch/pipermail/r-package-devel/2022q2/008140.html
https://stat.ethz.ch/pipermail/r-package-devel/2017q2/001678.html
https://stat.ethz.ch/pipermail/r-package-devel/2015q3/000271.html

> If you believe there are alternative strategies to achieve a similar
> result, please feel free to share your perspective.

There are approximately 2 active packages on CRAN. Looking for
useful packages by scanning a list of names will not be very effective.
Better results can be achieved using tools like RSiteSearch
. If you want a package to be more
visible, request its addition to a Task View
. If some packages are related,
make them link to each other in their documentation. David's options
are all very good.

> Additionally, I'm looking into the prospect of merging two packages
> that contain similar functionalities. The aim is to create a more
> comprehensive package by incorporation additional features and
> ensuring seamless compatibility.

The previous point about keeping backwards compatibility still stands.
It should be possible to move all the functions to one package and then
import() it from the other package. Both packages can then export() all
functions, making them available to the dependencies of either package.
Eventually, the skeleton package may grow packageStartupMessage()s
letting the users know that it is deprecated and could they please use
the other package instead. After a while, it should be possible to
archive the skeleton package. But deprecation cycles should be long:
for example, rgeos and rgdal took more than a year to retire
.

Or do you intend to come up with a completely new API? Beware of the
second system effect (although it's certainly not unheard of for second
system projects to succeed).

The spatstat package went through the opposite process a few years ago:
it grew too big and had to be split into multiple packages. Here's one
of its maintainers sharing the experience:
https://stat.ethz.ch/pipermail/r-package-devel/2022q4/008557.html

What is the nature of your final year project? If it can include
technical writing, you could add well-written vignettes to the packages
(only one of the CRAN packages maintained by people @uah.es has a
vignette, and it's very terse). If it has to be mostly programming or
maintenance of R packages, I'm out of ideas.

Either way, good luck, and I hope your project succeeds!

-- 
Best regards,
Ivan

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Re: [R-pkg-devel] Inquiry Regarding Package Organization in CRAN

2024-01-19 Thread David Hugh-Jones 
Hi Andriy

Renaming the packages seems quite drastic. It’ll break existing code and
the packages’ dependencies, and any existing name recognition will be lost.
I’m also a bit sceptical that it will greatly affect discoverability: I
don’t think most users find packages by scrolling through the big
alphabetical list.

Here are some less drastic alternatives :

* Post about new versions of the packages to r-pkgs mailing list.
* Write announcements, articles and/or blog posts for rweekly.org.
* if it’s appropriate, suggest the packages for one or more CRAN task
views.
* make sure you’ve got friendly online documentation. The pkgdown package
is pretty good for this, and many people host documentation on GitHub pages.

Best,
David

Writing: wyclif.substack.com
Book: www.wyclifsdust.com


On Fri, 19 Jan 2024 at 19:41, Protsak Andriy via R-package-devel <
r-package-devel@r-project.org> wrote:

> Hi all!
>
>
>
> My name is Andriy, and I’m a student at University of Alcalá, currently
> working on my final year project.
>
>
>
> I’m tasked with organizing the R packages developed by our university that
> are currently available on CRAN. The goal is to enhance their
> discoverability, to achieve this the initial focus is on exploring the
> possibility of renaming the packages so that they share a common prefix,
> making it easier for uses to locate them in the package list.
>
> If you believe there are alternative strategies to achieve a similar
> result, please feel free to share your perspective.
>
>
>
> Additionally, I’m looking into the prospect of merging two packages that
> contain similar functionalities. The aim is to create a more comprehensive
> package by incorporation additional features and ensuring seamless
> compatibility.
>
>
>
> Your assistance is key to the successful completion of my final year
> project, and I would be immensely grateful for any insights you can
> provide. Thank you for your time and consideration.
>
>
>
> Best regards,
>
>
>
> Andriy
>
> [[alternative HTML version deleted]]
>
> __
> R-package-devel@r-project.org mailing list
> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-package-devel
>

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