2 Install Software

You will need to install both \(R\) and \(R Studio\), but \(\LaTeX\) is optional.

2.1 The R Programing Language

The “Comprehensive R Archive Network” (CRAN) is a collection of sites which carry identical material, consisting of the \(R\) distribution(s), the contributed extensions (packages), and documentation for \(R\). From \(CRAN\), you can obtain the latest official FREE release of BASE \(R\).

Go to: www.r-project.org

  • Choose a CRAN mirror close to your geographical location
  • Select base \(R\) for your computer (Windows, Mac, ect.)
  • Once it is downloaded, run the installation.
  • The defaults are good…don’t change them…just keep clicking ‘Next’

The \(R\) Project website has an extensive FAQ

Each new release of \(R\) is given a name that references a Peanuts strip or film. Read some of the past names and find out where they came from: blog post

2.2 The R Studio IDE

Posit (formorly named ‘RStudio’) is a company that is also an active member of the \(R\) community. They believe free and open source data analysis software is a foundation for innovative and important work in science, education, and industry. Their namesake software, \(RStudio\), is an integrated development environment (IDE) for \(R\). It includes a console, syntax-highlighting editor that supports direct code execution, as well as tools for plotting, history, debugging and workspace management. They haven also recently developed an alternate called \(Quatro\) which I’m keeping a close eye on.

Go to: www.posit.co

  • Click the blue “DOWNLOAD RSTUDIO” buttom in the upper-right hand corner
  • Select the FREE Open Source Desktop Edition of \(R Studio\)
  • The defaults are good…don’t change them…just keep clicking ‘Next’

\(Posit\) has an entire online learning library. It is full of helpful links and resources for R programing, R markdown, and statistics.

Note: The \(R Consortium\) is a collaboration between the \(R\) Foundation, \(RStudio\), \(Microsoft\), \(TIBCO\), \(Google\), \(Oracle\), \(HP\) and others. It’s chartered to fund and inspire ideas that will enable \(R\) to become an even better platform for science, research, and industry.

2.3 TeX

\(\TeX\) or \(\LaTeX\) is a typesetting or formatting system that is commonly used in printing and publishing, especially anything with formulas (see https://texfaq.org/FAQ-whatTeX). It is NOT NEEDED to run \(R\), but \(R Studio\) must have access to it in order to knit a \(R Notebook\) into a .pdf file. There are many versions, but the following are the ones that work best with \(R\), depending on your computer’s platform.

The R package calledtinyteX is still a relatively new project which strives to offer all the functionality of \(\LaTeX\), but remain lightweight and easier to maintain compared to full installations of MacTeX or MikTeX. I am now using this in place of LaTeX!

Find out more about tinytex at https://yihui.org/tinytex/

To download and install tinytex you will need to copy-paste the following code into your console (or a code chunk) and run it. This only needs to be done once per computer.

install.packages('tinytex')
tinytex::install_tinytex()