R in a nutshell
by Adler, Joseph M.Eng, Joseph Adler · first published 2010
12mentions
5recommended by
11HN commenters
2010–2012first – last mentioned
45% recommend45% neutral9% critical
Why HN recommends it
Explains R itself rather than only statistical applications, aimed at readers with basic programming experience. Valued as a desktop quick reference and for filling gaps between basic stats tutorials and reference docs.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
Presents a guide to the R computer language, covering such topics as the user interface, packages, syntax, objects, functions, object-oriented programming, data sets, lattice graphics, regression models, and bioconductor.
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I work in a statistics-related field and use R daily. Most R books emphasize applications for statistics, not R itself; they're written for non-programmers. R in a Nutshell overviews R itself and assumes basic programming experience. I personally prefer this method, since I can just Google for any particular stats functions I need. If you're already a programmer, this is…
on “O'Reilly $9.99 Exclusive Best of "Ebook Deal of the Day"” ↗…http://cran.r-project.org/doc/contrib/Short-refcard.pdf was a savior and goes well with this piece. As others have mentioned, getting into the useful data structures and libraries is the next step here, because those are what makes R great. The book "R in a Nutshell" is a nice desktop reference, and the CRAN Task Views for your domain are a pretty helpful jumping off point: http://cran.r-project.org/web/views/ The R mailing list and Stack Overflow communities are…
on “R programming for those coming from other languages” ↗…style of data manipulation—I loved APL when I was younger—but almost all R documentation out in the wild is either "how to do some elementary statistical thing" or "reference", with little in between. "R in a Nutshell" is the best I've found so far at filling in the gaps that exist in my knowledge.
on “The R type system” ↗I do a good bit of R programming, and R in a Nutshell has been the best quick reference guide I have found.
on “How the R-project is taking over statistical analysis software” ↗Fair enough - I've had some good experience pointing new R users to R in a Nutshell - but maybe Data Manipulation with R is better. Haven't used it and will take a look. One invaluable resource I forgot to point out was: http://www.statmethods.net/ Very concise, directed pages that…
on “R programming for those coming from other languages” ↗R in a Nutshell, combined with this tutorial: http://yudkowsky.net/rational/bayes
on “What one book could give me a new, useful superpower?” ↗While I agree on the R mailing list and StackOverflow (subscribe for r on the RSS feed) i would respectfully suggest that you ignore R in a Nutshell. While it does have some interesting worked examples and some good explanation, the book is essentially a commented version of the R introductory manuals. The refcard is wonderful though. Personally,…
on “R programming for those coming from other languages” ↗Any thoughts on R in a Nutshell?
on “O'Reilly $9.99 Exclusive Best of "Ebook Deal of the Day"” ↗…to have a book for those who are interested in it as a programming language. I am sure there is a book like that, just that I haven't found it/them. If anyone has, would love to hear about it. Maybe "R in a nutshell" is the one, though I haven't checked it out yet.
on “Top 14 R posts of 2010 (from over 140 R blogs)” ↗Great suggestions from this thread, thanks all. Wound up getting: R in a Nutshell, 1Ed Real World Haskell, 1Ed iPhone Game Development, 1Ed Cocoa and Objective-C: Up and Running, 1Ed JavaScript: The Good Parts, 1Ed Programming Collective Intelligence, 1Ed Head First Statistics,…
on “O'Reilly is selling any eBook for $9.99 today” ↗I'm buying 'R in a Nutshell' and 'The Art of Debugging with GDB and DDD'.
on “O'Reilly is selling any eBook for $9.99 today” ↗Not sure that's possible. "R in a Nutshell" is 640 pages for a reason.
on “Calling R lovers to work together on “The R Programming wikibook” ” ↗