R and RStudio Set Up Instructions

R and RStudio

  • Download and install R, a free software environment for statistical computing and graphics from CRAN, the Comprehensive R Archive Network. It is highly recommended to install a precompiled binary distribution for your operating system – use the links up at the top of the CRAN page linked to above!

  • Install RStudio's IDE (stands for integrated development environment), a powerful user interface for R: http://www.rstudio.com/ide/download/

    • RStudio includes a text editor, so you do not have to install another stand-alone editor.
    • RStudio includes an interface to Git and GitHub. You will still need to install Git (covered elsewhere) but RStudio provides a basic GUI for interacting with Git(Hub).

Testing testing

  • Do whatever is appropriate for your OS to launch RStudio. You should get a window similar to the screenshot you see here, but yours will be more boring because you haven't written any code or made any figures yet!

  • Put your cursor in the pane labelled Console, which is where you interact with the live R process. Create a simple object with code like x <- 2 * 4 (followed by enter or return). Then inspect the x object by typing x followed by enter or return. Obviously you should see the value 8 print to screen. If yes, you are good to go.

  • To make sure that RStudio and Git can talk to each other, please follow the instructions in the corresponding section below.

Add-on packages

R is an extensible system and many people share useful code they have developed as a package via CRAN and github. To install a package from CRAN, for example the plyr package for data aggregation, here is one way to do it in the R console (there are others).

  install.packages("plyr", dependencies = TRUE)

By including dependencies = TRUE, we are being explicit and extra-careful to install any additional packages the target package, plyr in the example above, needs to have around.

Use the above method to install the following packages:

Communication between RStudio and Git

Obviously, RStudio can only act as a GUI front-end for Git if Git has been successfully installed and RStudio can find it.

It would be nice if you did this in advance, but we will also establish this connection in the workshop.

A basic test for successful installation of Git is to simply type git at the shell command line. If you get a complaint about Git not being found it means installation was unsuccessful or that it is not being found, i.e. it is not on your PATH.

If Git appears to be installed, launch RStudio. Quit and re-launch RStudio if there's any doubt in your mind about whether you opened RStudio before or after installing Git.

We will create a new dummy "Project" and direct RStudio to put it under version control

  • Do File > New Project.... You should see a pop up like this.
  • Select "New Directory: Start a project in a brand new working directory".
  • Select "Empty Project: Create a new project in an empty directory".
  • Create a new directory for this project anywhere you wish, perhaps with a name like test. You can delete this very soon.
  • Do Tools > Project Options.... Click on "Git/SVN". Select "Git" in the Version control system dropdown menu. Answer "yes" to the "Confirm New Git Repository" pop up. Answer "yes" to the "Confirm Restart RStudio" pop up.
  • After RStudio re-launches and opens your test Project, the upper left pane should have "Git" tab, typically along with "Environment", "History", etc. You can see an example in this screenshot.
  • If this has gone well, it looks like Git and RStudio are ready to work together! Feel free to quite RStudio and delete the test directory/Project.

In some circumstances, it may be necessary to explicitly tell RStudio where to find the Git executable.

  • Do RStudio > Preferences or, alternatively, do Tools > Global Options....
  • Click on "Git/SVN".
  • Fill in the Git executable field correctly. Here is a screenshot of someone doing this on a Windows machine.
  • If you think Git has been installed but you're not sure where it is, entering which git at the shell command line should reveal the path to the Git executable.

Further resources

The above will get your basic setup ready but here are some links if you are interested in reading a bit further.

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