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R Resources & Getting Help
Brian High, Nancy Carmona & Chris Zuidema
![CC BY-SA 4.0](images/cc_by-sa_4.png)
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Learning Objectives

You will learn about:

  • R's Internal Help Features
  • R Package Documentation
  • Support through Online Forums
  • How to Ask for Help
  • Free Online R Courses
  • Free Online R Tutorials
  • Free R Books

R's Internal Help Features

You can access R's internal documentation with functions like:

# Example                               # Description
# ------------------------------------- # --------------------------------------
help.start()                            # Open the top-level help index
help(vector)                            # Search the help system by topic
?matrix                                 # (same as above)
help.search("RNA")                      # Search the help system by string
??hookworm                              # (same as above)
apropos("array")                        # Find objects by partial name
args(read.table)                        # Shows the arguments for a function
example(data.frame)                     # Run the example code from the package
vignette(package = "data.table")        # Show list of vignettes for this package
vignette("datatable-intro-vignette")    # Open this vignette in the help viewer
browseVignettes("grid")                 # Show an HTML page of vignettes for a topic
RSiteSearch("tibble")                   # Search http://search.r-project.org
demo(graphics)                          # Run the demo script for this package

As shown above, some help functions expect the argument to be quoted.

The first link provided by help.start() goes to An Introduction to R.

See also: R FAQ, Getting Help with R (R Project), and Getting Help with R (RStudio).

The Help Tab in the Viewer Pane

R Package Documentation

A package will usually have documentation containing one or more of the following:

  • index
  • a DESCRIPTION file
  • guides for functions (with examples), classes, and data
  • vignettes, including tutorials and FAQs
  • demos
  • a NEWS file

The index for CRAN packages can be found using a URL like:

https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/PACKAGE/index.html

... where PACKAGE would be replaced with the actual package name.

Example: tidyr package index

R Cheat Sheets

Many R packages have Cheatsheets to help with common tasks and questions.

Support through Online Forums

If you have searched R Seek, the online documentation, and the web in general -- and still can't solve your problem, you can request help by posting to an online forum.

Help Forums

General Discussion Forums

How to Ask for Help

There are several guides to asking for help in a way which will not annoy the support forum.

Basically, when posting questions:

  • Do your homework carefully
  • Be clear, specific, and thorough
  • Be respectful and mature
  • Provide a reproducible example of your problem
  • Don't expect strangers on the Internet to solve your homework problems for you

Our Favorite Free Online R Courses

Our Favorite Free Online R Tutorials

CodeSchool's Try-R

You do not need to "register" or create an account to run the tutorial. This tutorial is aimed at first-time R users. (Try-R)

Swirl tutorials

See if you can get through all 15 segments of the "R Programming: The basics of programming in R" course (Swirl, Swirl Guide). Use the alternative version, "R Programming Alt". Install it like this:

install.packages("swirl")
library(swirl)
install_from_swirl("R Programming Alt")
swirl()

R Books: "Free" (UW-licensed) eBooks

These are available at no cost to UW students, staff, or faculty. The links we have provided (for the title text) are to the UW-licensed copy. There are many more R books available through the UW, but these are some of our favorites.

More of Our Favorite R Books

These ebooks are from the developers of the Tidyverse family of packages:

The UW has all of these (in print and ebook editions) and the Seattle Public Library (SPL) has two of these as eBooks through O'Reilly's Safari website. Seattle residents may obtain a free SPL library card to gain access to these eBooks. The title text has been linked to the publisher's website for each book.

                                                                                        
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