This course will examine two R packages: The Rcmdr ("R Commander") package, with provides an extensible basic-statistics graphical user interface (GUI) for R; and the sem package, which provides a latent-variable structural-equation modeling facility in R. I will describe the general design principles employed in developing these packages, and will discuss how to add to their capabilities. Each student, working either independently or collaboratively, will complete a project that augments one of the two packages. I assume that students have some familiarity with R programming.
Outline
| Topic | Dates | Resources |
| 1. Introduction to the R Commander and the sem package | Fri, May 19, 11:00-14:00 | R Commander web site; paper on the Rcmdr package in the Journal of Statistic Software; paper on the sem package in Structural Equation Modeling ; Appendix on SEMs from An R and S-PLUS Companion to Applied Regression.; sem example (R script, notes) |
| 2. Adding to the Rcmdr package | Fri, May 26, 11:00-14:00 | Peter Dalgaard's R News articles (first, second) on the tcltk package; R tcltk examples; Tcl/Tk manual on-line; chapters from Practical Programming in Tcl and Tk; functions exported by the Rcmdr; tcltk and Rcmdr examples |
| 3. Project presentations | Fri, June 30, 11:00-14:00 | Some project suggestions |
Location: PC Lab, UZA 2, Level 5
Last change: 2006-05-22 by J. Fox <jfox AT mcmaster.ca>