Version 18 of R

"R [L1 ] is a language and environment for statistical computing and graphics" [L2 ]. For more background on R, see the July 2003 installment of "Server Clinic" [L3 ], as well as the later series here [L4 ] and here [L5 ].

R apparently binds to Tcl, Tk, and Visual Tcl in ways that have yet to be clearly described [L6 ]. Seductive screen-shots appear at http://www.bioconductor.org/Screenshots/index.html , for example. Brodgar is crucial.

Peter Dalgaard says in comp.lang.tcl that http://CRAN.R-project.org/doc/Rnews/ should be used as a source for more recent information; particularly in vol 1/3 and 2/3.

He goes on to say:

"What we currently have is a Tcl interpreter embedded in R and interface routines and (some) object reflection and communication mechanisms, which allow you to run Tcl stuff from within R.

What we don't have is the reverse: Mechanisms that let you control R from Tcl. Well, we do have some rudiments of it, but not as elaborate as in the other direction. In principle R is embeddable; you can build R as a shared object and link it into another program, but you probably need to jump through a few hoops to get event loops and such stuff right. (I believe http://developer.r-project.org/embedded.html is the best documentation we have.)"

That was the situation in early 2003. A few hours before the year ended, though, Neil McKay announced availability of Rtcl.

 What: R
 Where: http://www.r-project.org/
        http://cran.r-project.org/
        http://lib.stat.cmu.edu/R/
        http://www.gnu.org/software/r/R.html>
        http://www.ci.tuwien.ac.at/%7Ehornik/R/R-FAQ.html
        http://stat.auckland.ac.nz/rproj.html
 Description: Statistical computing and visualization language,
        similar to the S language.
        Provides a wide variety of techniques.
        Comes with a tcltk package, providing interface and language bindings
         for Tcl/Tk.
        Makes use of plplot.
        Note that Mark Myatt mailto:[email protected] is
         writing a syntax highlighting editor to be used as a front-end
         of R; contact him for details.
        Currently at version 1.5.0 .
 Updated: 01/2003
 Contact: See web site