Re: [Gretl-devel] A way to read RData files in gretl
On Wed, 27 Sep 2017, Allin Cottrell wrote:
On Wed, 27 Sep 2017, Sven Schreiber wrote:
> Am 25.09.2017 um 00:29 schrieb oleg_komashko(a)ukr.net:
>> During the recent times there were several threads on importing RData
>> files into gretl
>>
>> The attachment contains a function to open RData files in gretl
>>
>> In contrast to the native foreign importers it requires R installed (not a
>> strong requirement, at least on linux, since R is included into
>> dependencies list for building gretl)
>
> Thanks Oleh, that sounds very good.
>
> Here is a general comment to all: I think that maybe it is time to
> reconsider the policy that gretl function packages must not depend on R. R
> has become so widespread, and also we have in gretl the very nice
> possibility to define and call your own R functions directly (see section
> 38.7 of the user guide), that it almost seems silly not to leverage all the
> potential. Even Eviews has been doing it for a while already.
I agree; I'd be OK with gretl packages that depend on R -- provided that what
they do really requires R, it's not something that can be done without too
much difficulty using native gretl commands or functions.
Ok, I hear what you say.
However, I'm not too keen on the idea that someone downloads a package,
watches it fail because R is not installed and concludes that "gretl
sucks".
What if we added a flag to the package properties ("needs_R" or similar),
and then we forbid installation of the package if R is not on the system,
with an appropriately prominent error message?
That would be rather easy to do, and prevent misunderstandings.
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Riccardo (Jack) Lucchetti
Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche e Sociali (DiSES)
Università Politecnica delle Marche
(formerly known as Università di Ancona)
r.lucchetti(a)univpm.it
http://www2.econ.univpm.it/servizi/hpp/lucchetti
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