Not yet written a package?

Take a look at these resources!

• Earo Wang's R-Ladies talk "Everything you need to know to create your own R package" https://github.com/earowang/rladies-pkg
• Maëlle Salmon's satRdays workshop https://github.com/maelle/satrday_package_workshop
• Forwards Package Development Workshop https://github.com/forwards/workshops/tree/master/Cville2019

Update with Johannesburg satRday 2020 workshop materials soon!

Why publish on CRAN?

• Sign of quality
  • Code is ready to be used (not a beta version)
  • Basic standards: documented code, running examples, etc
  • Works with current version of R and other packages
  • Commitment of maintainer
• Discoverability
• Ease of installation
• Bioconductor, rOpenSci: even higher standards, code review

Preparing for CRAN release

As someone who hopes to submit their first package 📦to CRAN this year… what should I know? 😳

— We are R-Ladies (@WeAreRLadies) February 13, 2020

Useful resources

• Hadley Wickham's R Packages gives good advice: http://r-pkgs.had.co.nz/release.html
• usethis::use_release_issue() creates a GitHub issue with a checklist.
• See also
  • https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/submission_checklist.html
  • https://github.com/ThinkR-open/prepare-for-cran
• Useful functions for additional checks:
  • goodpractice::gp()
  • spelling::spell_check_package()

Promoting your package

• Some promotion will/may be done for you: CRANberries, R Views Monthly Top 40, search engines (vignette/pkgdown site)
• Some channels are obvious: website, blog, Twitter (#rstats)
• Consider RPubs or gist for one-off tutorial/case study, e.g.
  • https://gist.github.com/sckott/08de710da349e48ede3e
  • https://rpubs.com/mdbrown/TreatmentSelection
• Publicize your new package via R Weekly https://rweekly.org/
  • Add to the weekly news blog, see CONTRIBUTING, and example pull requests new package, new version.
• Would your package fit in a CRAN Task View? https://cran.r-project.org/web/views/
  • Check description for how to propose addition

Talks

• Meetups: RUGs, R-Ladies, satRdays
• Conferences (https://jumpingrivers.github.io/meetingsR/events.html)
  • General: useR!, rstudio::conf, satRdays
  • Specific: Insurance Data Science Conference, BiocAsia 2020
  • Non R-specific: ???
• Conferences provide greater exposure, particular to people working in relevant field(s).
• Don't forget to share your slides! (Conference/personal website, LinkedIn, RPubs, Slideshare)

Paper

• A paper not only promotes your package but benefits from peer review
  • Paper can also overlap with vignette
• Traditional journals:
  • Open Source Software: The R Journal, Journal of Statistical Software
  • Computing: Computational Statistics and Data Analysis, Journal of Computational and Graphical Statistics, SoftwareX
  • Science: Bioinformatics, PLOS ONE, Method in Ecology and Evolution
• Alternative journals:
  • F1000research Bioconductor/R package gateway: publish, then open review
  • Journal Open Source Software: open code review, short descriptive paper

Research compendium

• A research compendium can showcase your work in a reproducible workflow
  • Could demonstrate a protocol/pipeline vs research study.
• Advice on how to structure a research compendium is given by rOpenSci: https://github.com/ropensci/rrrpkg
• The research compendium can be published on Zenodo, Figshare or Dryad
  • DOI points to a particular version (e.g. matching results in a paper)
  • Example using R: https://zenodo.org/record/61312#.WfnvS3BpFWO

Interacting with users

• Add a BugReports url to your DESCRIPTION
  • Using GitHub issues means that people can see if bug already reported and what action has been taken
• Consider creating an RSS feed for relevant StackOverflow questions
  • DIY based on search terms: https://meta.stackexchange.com/a/238460
  • Based on package tag (requires >1,500 reputation to add tag)
• Bug reports/help requests
  • Can show where documentation/tests need improving
  • Help you find out who's using your package and what for
  • Can give ideas for new features
  • Can lead to collaborations

Interacting with developers

• Add a CONTRIBUTING.md to your GitHub repository
  • Do you have a style guide?
  • Reminders to run check/tests/add NEWS item to pull requests
• Use tags to highlight issues: the following are promoted by GitHub
  • help wanted
  • good first issue
• Add a code of conduct: make sure everyone knows ground rules for happy collaboration and a welcoming community
  • devtools::use_code_of_conduct adds Contributor Covenant
  • Be prepared to enforce!

Don't keep it to yourself!