I am building a R package using devtools. All documentation is built using roxygen2. For the functions this works all fine, but how can I provide a help page for the whole package, that lists all the available functions.
In other packages there's always a link in the bottom of each help page which leads to the index page:
Screenshot from dplyr package (exemplary index link)
How can I built/link this index page with devtools?
EDIT: If I access a help page by "?functionName", there will be also the following output printed to the console "Using development documentation for functionName". From the github repository of devtools I find the function dev-help.R that gives this output. In its comments it's stated that links won't work with this development help.
Note that this only renders a single documentation file, so that links to other files within the package won't work.
So how can I use the normal documentation instead of dev-help?
Found the solution. If you have the following workflow:
create()
document()
build()
install.packages()
library(<pkg-name>)
the documentation will be loaded in the namespace of R during document(). Accordingly, a later call of ?functionName will refer to the development stage of the documentation and not the one provided by the compiled package.
Thus, creating a fresh R session after installation just solves the issue!
Related
I want to cite another package (the whole package, not just a function from it) in the documentation of some functions I'm developing. I am using Roxygen2 comments to document my package functions.
I cannot find a way to create a link to a whole third-party package using Roxygen2. To link to a package function, one would write [pkg::fun()] but I don't know how to create a link to the package itself.
Some packages expose a general man page, and it's possible to link to it via e.g. [pkg::pkg].
But many packages don't have this and there's just a general package vignette with the list of functions and a link to the description:
Such page can be reached by clicking on a package name in the packages tab in RStudio.
How can I link to it from a function documentation made in Roxygen2 markdown.?
You cannot link to the page that comes up when you click on the name of a package in RStudio's Packages pane. RStudio invisibly calls help(package = "<name>"), which renders the package's index.
From the R-exts manual:
The markup \link{foo} (usually in the combination \code{\link{foo}}) produces a hyperlink to the help for foo. Here foo is a topic, that is the argument of \alias markup in another Rd file (possibly in another package).
Hence \link and the equivalent Markdown markup supported by roxygen2 can only link to topics. A package index is not a topic in this sense because there is no corresponding Rd file.
It might be best just to remind users that they can use help to access the index of the package to which you are referring.
I made a package in R called "my_package_name". When I run ?my_package_name or ??_my_package_name, no results are found. I want a help file to be loaded in the same way that ?ggplot2 loads a package help file.
I can run ?my_function_name to obtain the help files for my functions. However, this does not work with my package name, even though the description file is complete. I found that help(package = my_package_name) loads a page that contains the description file and help pages, but I would like load a page with ?my_package_name.
I would say that the easiest way is probably to run the following from the usethis package. It will create the file needed to have your package documentation
usethis::use_package_doc()
I suggest reading the documentation of the function to understand what's going on under the hood.
I'm developing an R package, and I'm trying to make a link from the manual of the package to its vignette (a pdf). I've make this in the R function code, and it works:
\link[=../doc/package.pdf]{package's User Manual}
The problem is that the devtools::check() complains with a warning, which also causes a delay in the process of revision when uploading to CRAN...
* checking Rd cross-references ... WARNING
Missing link or links in documentation object 'package.Rd':
'../doc/package.pdf'
Is there a better way of linking from man to vignette? or it is not correct to do so? As the pdf can contain more graphical information, it seems desirable to be able to link to it.
If you use pkgdown to make a website out of your package, then you can directly link to the url of the specific vignette.
Or you can just write
Run \code{vignette("NAME_OF_YOUR_VIGNETTE", package = "NAME_OF_YOUR_PACKAGE")} to see the corresponding vignette.
I am wondering if there is a possibility, during writing a package in R, to link to the documentation page in R that has no functions included but has only package-info?
For example \link[stats]{stats-package.R}?
One of the possibillities is \link[stats]{stats-package} without .R extansion (but it will link to stats-package page). If you just want to link the package use \pkg{package} e.g. \pkg{stats}. For more info try Writing R Extensions
I'm new to Rcpp and want to export some C++ class into R. I've install RcppExmples intending to learn some code snippet. But I didn't even know how to use it? help(RcppExamples) only to get:
Description:
This package shows some simple examples for the use of ‘Rcpp’.
Both the older ('classic') and new API are documented.
It can also serve as a working template to create packages that
use ‘Rcpp’ to interface C++ code or libraries.
Where can I get the examples?
The sources for the examples in the package are, well, in the package itself.
This is Rcpp. It works with C++ source code, and R code. You don't use this like a normal package, you create packages with it. From source.
Did you had a look at the manual? I think it's clear from this document. But the DESCRIPTION file says:
Note that the documentation in this package currently does not cover all the features in the package. It is not even close.
So I fear that's all you can get - besides looking at the source code.