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R Foundation News, Kurt Hornik

The R Journal

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Identifying Complex Causal Dependencies In Configurational Data With Coincidence Analysis, Michael Baumgartner, Alrik Thiem

The R Journal

We present cna, a package for performing Coincidence Analysis (CNA). CNA is a configurational comparative method for the identification of complex causal dependencies—in particular, causal chains and common cause structures—in configurational data. After a brief introduction to the method’s theoretical background and main algorithmic ideas, we demonstrate the use of the package by means of an artificial and a real-life data set. Moreover, we outline planned enhancements of the package that will further increase its applicability.

Fslr: Connecting The Fsl Software With R, John Muschelli, Elizabeth Sweeney, Martin Lindquist, Ciprian Crainiceanu

The R Journal

We present the package fslr, a set of R functions that interface with FSL (FMRIB Software Library), a commonly-used open-source software package for processing and analyzing neuroimaging data. The fslr package performs operations on ‘nifti’ image objects in R using command-line functions from FSL, and returns R objects back to the user. fslr allows users to develop image processing and analysis pipelines based on FSL functionality while interfacing with the functionality provided by R. We present an example of the analysis of structural magnetic resonance images, which demonstrates how R users can leverage the functionality of FSL without switching …

The R Journal (June 2015) 7(1): Complete Issue, The R Foundation

The R Journal

Editorial, Bettina Grün

Contributed Research Articles

Peptides: A Package for Data Mining of Antimicrobial Peptides, Daniel Osorio, Paola Rondón-Villarreal, and Rodrigo Torres

fanplot: An R Package for Visualising Sequential Distributions, Guy J. Abel

sparkTable: Generating Graphical Tables for Websites and Documents with R, Alexander Kowarik, Bernhard Meindl, and Matthias Templ

rdrobust: An R Package for Robust Nonparametric Inference in Regression-Discontinuity Designs, Sebastian Calonico, Matias D. Cattaneo, and Rocío Titiunik

Frames2: A Package for Estimation in Dual Frame Surveys, Antonio Arcos, David Molina, Maria Giovanna Ranalli, and María del Mar Rueda

The Complex Multivariate Gaussian Distribution, Robin K. S. Hankin

sae: …

R As An Environment For Reproducible Analysis Of Dna Amplification Experiments, Stefan Rödiger, Michał Burdukiewicz, Konstantin Blagodatskikh, Michael Jahn, Peter Schierack

The R Journal

There is an ever-increasing number of applications, which use quantitative PCR (qPCR) or digital PCR (dPCR) to elicit fundamentals of biological processes. Moreover, quantitative isothermal amplification (qIA) methods have become more prominent in life sciences and point-of-care diagnostics. Additionally, the analysis of melting data is essential during many experiments. Several software packages have been developed for the analysis of such datasets. In most cases, the software is either distributed as closed source software or as monolithic block with little freedom to perform highly customized analysis procedures. We argue, among others, that R is an excellent foundation for reproducible and transparent …

Sae: An R Package For Small Area Estimation, Isabel Molina, Yolanda Marhuenda

The R Journal

We describe the R package sae for small area estimation. This package can be used to obtain model-based estimates for small areas based on a variety of models at the area and unit levels, along with basic direct and indirect estimates. Mean squared errors are estimated by analytical approximations in simple models and applying bootstrap procedures in more complex models. We describe the package functions and show how to use them through examples.

Frames2: A Package For Estimation In Dual Frame Surveys, Antonio Arcos, David Molina, Maria Giovanna Ranalli, Maria Del Mar Rueda

The R Journal

Data from complex survey designs require special consideration with regard to estimation of finite population parameters and corresponding variance estimation procedures, as a consequence of significant departures from the simple random sampling assumption. In the past decade a number of statistical software packages have been developed to facilitate the analysis of complex survey data. All these statistical software packages are able to treat samples selected from one sampling frame containing all population units. Dual frame surveys are very useful when it is not possible to guarantee a complete coverage of the target population and may result in considerable cost savings …

Sparktable: Generating Graphical Tables For Websites And Documents With R, Alexander Kowarik, Bernhard Meindl, Matthias Templ

The R Journal

Visual analysis of data is important to understand the main characteristics, main trends and relationships in data sets and it can be used to assess the data quality. Using the R package sparkTable, statistical tables holding quantitative information can be enhanced by including spark-type graphs such as sparklines [] and sparkbars [].

These kind of graphics are well-known in literature and are considered as simple, intense and illustrative graphs that are small enough to fit in a single line. Thus, they can easily enrich tables and texts with additional information in a comprehensive visual way.

The R package sparkTable …

Fanplot: An R Package For Visualising Sequential Distributions, Guy J. Abel

The R Journal

Fan charts, first developed by the Bank of England in 1996, have become a standard method for visualising forecasts with uncertainty. Using shading fan charts focus the attention towards the whole distribution away from a single central measure. This article describes the basics of plotting fan charts using an R add-on package alongside some additional methods for displaying sequential distributions. Examples are based on distributions of both estimated parameters from a time series model and future values with uncertainty.

The Gridgraphics Package, Paul Murrell

The R Journal

The gridGraphics package provides a function, grid.echo(), that can be used to convert a plot drawn with the graphics package to a visually identical plot drawn using grid. This conversion provides access to a variety of grid tools for making customisations and additions to the plot that are not possible with the graphics package/

Peptides: A Package For Data Mining Of Antimicrobial Peptides, Daniel Osorio, Paola Rondón-Villarreal, Rodrigo Torres

The R Journal

Antimicrobial peptides (AMP) are a promising source of antibiotics with a broad spectrum activity against bacteria and low incidence of developing resistance. The mechanism by which an AMPexecutes its function depends on a set of computable physicochemical properties from the amino acid sequence. The Peptides package was designed to allow the quick and easy computation of ten structural characteristics own of the antimicrobial peptides, with the aim of generating data to increase the accuracy in classification and design of new amino acid sequences. Moreover, the options to read and plot XVG output files from GROMACS molecular dynamics package are included.

Correspondence Analysis On Generalised Aggregated Lexical Tables (Ca-Galt) In The Factominer Package, Belchin Kostov, Mónica Bécue-Bertaut, François Husson

The R Journal

Correspondence analysis on generalised aggregated lexical tables (CA-GALT) is a method that generalizes classical CA-ALT to the case of several quantitative, categorical and mixed variables. It aims to establish a typology of the external variables and a typology of the events from their mutual relationships. In order to do so, the influence of external variables on the lexical choices is untangled cancelling the associations among them, and to avoid the instability issued from multicollinearity, they are substituted by their principal components. The CaGalt function, implemented in the FactoMineR package, provides numerous numerical and graphical outputs. Confidence ellipses are also provided …

Rdrobust: An R Package For Robust Nonparametric Inference In Regression-Discontinuity Designs, Sebastian Calonico, Matias D. Cattaneo, Rocío Titiunik

The R Journal

This article describes the R package rdrobust, which provides data-driven graphical and in ference procedures for RD designs. The package includes three main functions: rdrobust, rdbwselect and rdplot. The first function (rdrobust) implements conventional local-polynomial RD treatment effect point estimators and confidence intervals, as well as robust bias-corrected confidence intervals, for average treatment effects at the cutoff. This function covers sharp RD, sharp kink RD, fuzzy RD and fuzzy kink RD designs, among other possibilities. The second function (rdbwselect) implements several bandwidth selectors proposed in the RD literature. The third function (rdplot) provides data-driven optimal choices of evenly-spaced and …

News From The Bioconductor Project, Bioconductor Team

The R Journal

The Bioconductor project provides tools for the analysis and comprehension of high throughput genomic data. The 1024 software packages available in Bioconductor can be viewed at http://bioconductor.org/packages/. Navigate packages using ‘biocViews’ terms and title search. Each package has an html page with a description, links to vignettes, reference manuals, and usage statistics. Start using Bioconductor version 3.1 by installing R 3.2.1 and evaluating the commandS

Implementing Persistent O(1) Stacks And Queues In R, Shawn T. O'Neil

The R Journal

True to their functional roots, most R functions are side-effect-free, and users expect datatypes to be persistent. However, these semantics complicate the creation of efficient and dynamic data structures. Here, we describe the implementation of stack and queue data structures satisfying these conditions in R, available in the CRAN package rstackdeque. Guided by important work in purely functional languages, we look at both partially- and fully-persistent versions of queues, comparing their performance characteristics. Finally, we illustrate the usefulness of such dynamic structures with examples of generating and solving mazes.

Showtext: Using System Fonts In R Graphics, Yixuan Qiu

The R Journal

This article introduces the showtext package that makes it easy to use system fonts in R graphics. Unlike other methods to embedfonts into graphics, showtext converts text into raster images or polygons, and then adds them to the plot canvas. This method produces platform-independent image files that do not rely on the fonts that create them. It supports a large number of font formats and Rgraphics devices, and meanwhile provides convenient features such as using web fonts and integrating with knitr. This article provides an elaborate introduction to the showtext package, including its design, usage, and examples.

Editorial, Bettina Grün

The R Journal

On behalf of the editorial board, I am pleased to publish Volume 7, Issue 1 of the R Journal. This issue contains 16 contributed research articles. Each of them either presents an R package, a specific extension of an R package or applications using R packages available from the Comprehensive R Archive Network (CRAN, http:://CRAN.R-project.org). It thus provides a small insight into the wide variety of functionality covered currently by the more than 6800 packages available from CRAN.

Manipulation Of Discrete Random Variables With Discreterv, Eric Hare, Andreas Buja, Heike Hofmann

The R Journal

A prominent issue in statistics education is the sometimes large disparity between the theoretical and the computational coursework. discreteRV is an R package for manipulation of discrete random variables which uses clean and familiar syntax similar to the mathematical notation in introductory probability courses. The package offers functions that are simple enough for users with little experience with statistical programming, but has more advanced features which are suitable for a large number of more complex applications. In this paper, we introduce and motivate discreteRV, describe its functionality, and provide reproducible examples illustrating its use.

The Complex Multivariate Gaussian Distribution, Robin K.S. Hankin

The R Journal

Here I introduce package cmvnorm, a complex generalization of the mvtnorm package. A complex generalization of the Gaussian process is suggested and numerical results presented using the package. An application in the context of approximating the Weierstrass-function using a complex Gaussian process is given.

Changes On Cran, Kurt Hornik, Achim Zeileis

The R Journal

New packages in CRAN task views

New contributed packages

Other changes

News From The Bioconductor Project, The Bioconductor Team

The R Journal

The Bioconductor project provides tools for the analysis and comprehension of high throughput genomic data. The 934 software packages available in Bioconductor can be viewed at http://bioconductor.org/packages/release/. Navigate packages using ‘biocViews’ terms and title search. Each package has an html page with a description, links to vignettes, reference manuals, and usage statistics. Start using Bioconductor and R version 3.1

Changes In R, The R Core Team

The R Journal

CHANGES IN 3.1.2

R Foundation News, Martin Mächler, Kurt Hornik

The R Journal

New R Foundation board

New ordinary members

Donations and new supporting members

Conference Report Polish Academic R User Meeting, Maciej Beręsewicz, Alicja Szabelska, Joanna Zyprych-Walczak, Łukasz Wawrowski

The R Journal

The first national conference “Polish Academic R User Meeting” (PAZUR) was held at the Poznan University of Economics from October 15–17, 2014. The organizers of the conference were the Department of Statistics at the Poznan University of Economics (PUE), the Department of Mathematical and Statistical Methods at the Poznan University of Life Sciences (PULS) and SKN Estymator, the students scientific association that resides at the Department of Statistics at the Poznan University of Economics. The honorary patronage of the conference took Professor Emil Panek, Dean of the Faculty of Informatics and Electronic Economy PUE and Professor Wiesław Koziara, Dean of …

Conference Report: R In Insurance 2014, Markus Gesmann, Andreas Tsanakas

The R Journal

The 2nd Rin Insurance conference took place at Cass Business School London on 14 July 2014. This one-day conference focused once more on the wide range of applications of Rin insurance, actuarial science and beyond. The conference programme covered topics including reserving, pricing, loss modelling, the use of R in a production environment and muchmore.

Qmethod: A Package To Explore Human Perspectives Using Q Methodology, Aiora Zabala

The R Journal

Q is a methodology to explore the distinct subjective perspectives that exist within a group. It is used increasingly across disciplines. The methodology is semi-qualitative and the data are analysed using data reduction methods to discern the existing patterns of thought. This package is the first to perform Q analysis in R, and it provides many advantages to the existing software: namely, it is fully cross-platform, the algorithms can be transparently examined, it provides results in a clearly structured and tabulated form ready for further exploration and modelling, it produces a graphical summary of the results, and it generates a …

Farewell's Linear Increments Model For Missing Data: The Flim Package, Rune Hoff, Jon Michael Gran, Daniel Farewell

The R Journal

Missing data is common in longitudinal studies. We present a package for Farewell’s Linear Increments Model for Missing Data (the FLIM package), which can be used to fit linear models for observed increments of longitudinal processes and impute missing data. The method is valid for data with regular observation patterns. The end result is a list of fitted models and a hypothetical complete dataset corresponding to the data we might have observed had individuals not been missing. The FLIM package may also be applied to longitudinal studies for causal analysis, by considering counterfactual data as missing data- for instance to …

Smr: An R Package For Computing The Externally Studentized Normal Midrange Distribution, Ben Dêivide, Oliveira Batista, Daniel Furtado Ferreira

The R Journal

The main purpose of this paper is to present the main algorithms underlining the con struction and implementation of the SMR package, whose aim is to compute studentized normal midrange distribution. Details on the externally studentized normal midrange and standardized normal midrange distributions are also given. The package follows the same structure as the prob ability functions implemented in R. That is: the probability density function (dSMR), the cumulative distribution function (pSMR), the quantile function (qSMR) and the random number generating function (rSMR). Pseudocode and illustrative examples of how to use the package are presented.

Sgof: An R Package For Multiple Testing Problems, Irene Castro-Conde, Jacob De Uña-Álvarez

The R Journal

In this paper we present a new R package called sgof for multiple hypothesis testing. The principal aim of this package is to implement SGoF-type multiple testing methods, known to be more powerful than the classical false discovery rate (FDR) and family-wise error rate (FWER) based methods in certain situations, particularly when the number of tests is large. This package includes Bi nomial and Conservative SGoF and the Bayesian and Beta-Binomial SGoF multiple testing procedures, which are adaptations of the original SGoF method to the Bayesian setting and to possibly correlated tests, respectively. The sgof package also implements the Benjamini-Hochberg …

Flexible R Functions For Processing Accelerometer Data, With Emphasis On Nhanes 2003–2006, Dane R. Van Domelen, W. Stephen Pittard

The R Journal

Accelerometers are a valuable tool for measuring physical activity (PA) in epidemiological studies. However, considerable processing is needed to convert time-series accelerometer data into meaningful variables for statistical analysis. This article describes two recently developed R packages for processing accelerometer data. The package accelerometry contains functions for performing various data processing procedures, such as identifying periods of non-wear time and bouts of activity. The functions are flexible, computationally efficient, and compatible with uniaxial or triaxial data. The package nhanesaccel is specifically for processing data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), years 2003–2006. Its primary function generates measures …