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10-intro.Rmd
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---
output: html_document
editor_options:
chunk_output_type: console
---
# Introduction {#intro}
## What is R? {#what-r}
R was not designed to be a bona-fide programming language.
It is an evolution of the S language, developed at Bell labs (later Lucent) as a wrapper for the endless collection of statistical libraries they wrote in Fortran.
As of 2011, half of R's libraries are [actually written in C](https://wrathematics.github.io/2011/08/27/how-much-of-r-is-written-in-r/).
## The R Ecosystem {#ecosystem}
A large part of R's success is due to the ease in which a user, or a firm, can augment it.
This led to a large community of users, developers, and protagonists.
Some of the most important parts of R's ecosystem include:
- [CRAN](https://cran.r-project.org/):
a repository for R packages, mirrored worldwide.
- [R-help](https://www.r-project.org/mail.html):
an immensely active mailing list.
Noways being replaced by StackExchange meta-site.
Look for the R tags in the [StackOverflow](http://stackoverflow.com/) and [CrossValidated](http://stats.stackexchange.com/) sites.
- [Task Views](https://cran.r-project.org/web/views/):
part of CRAN that collects packages per topic.
- [Bioconductor](https://www.bioconductor.org/):
A CRAN-like repository dedicated to the life sciences.
- [Neuroconductor](https://www.neuroconductor.org/):
A CRAN-like repository dedicated to neuroscience, and neuroimaging.
- [Books](https://www.r-project.org/doc/bib/R-books.html):
An insane amount of books written on the language. Some are free, some are not.
- [The Israeli-R-user-group](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/israel-r-user-group):
just like the name suggests.
- Commercial R: being open source and lacking support may seem like a problem that would prohibit R from being adopted for commercial applications.
This void is filled by several very successful commercial versions such as [Microsoft R](https://mran.microsoft.com/open/), with its accompanying CRAN equivalent called [MRAN](https://mran.microsoft.com/), [Tibco's Spotfire](http://spotfire.tibco.com/discover-spotfire/what-does-spotfire-do/predictive-analytics/tibco-enterprise-runtime-for-r-terr), and [others](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R_(programming_language)#Commercial_support_for_R).
- [RStudio](https://www.rstudio.com/products/rstudio/download-server/): since its earliest days R came equipped with a minimal text editor.
It later received plugins for major integrated development environments (IDEs) such as Eclipse, WinEdit and even [VisualStudio](https://www.visualstudio.com/vs/rtvs/).
None of these, however, had the impact of the RStudio IDE.
Written completely in JavaScript, the RStudio IDE allows the seamless integration of cutting edge web-design technologies, remote access, and other killer features, making it today's most popular IDE for R.
- [CheatSheets](https://www.rstudio.com/resources/cheatsheets/) Rstudio curates a list of CheatSheets. Very useful to print some, and have them around when coding.
- [RStartHere](https://github.com/rstudio/RStartHere/blob/master/README.md#import): a curated list of useful packages.
## Bibliographic Notes
For more on the history of R see
[AT&T's site](http://www.research.att.com/articles/featured_stories/2013_09/201309_SandR.html?fbid=Yxy4qyQzmMa),
John Chamber's talk at [UserR!2014](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_hcpuRB5nGs),
Nick Thieme's [recent report](https://rss.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1740-9713.2018.01169.x) in Significance, or
[Revolution Analytics'](https://blog.revolutionanalytics.com/2017/10/updated-history-of-r.html) blog.
You can also consult the Introduction chapter of the MASS book [@venables2013modern].