[R] Finding out about objects and classes

[Prof Brian Ripley]

On Tue, 17 Oct 2006, michael watson (IAH-C) wrote:

> When R help simply states something like:
>
> Value:
>
>     An object of class '"loess"'.
>
> How do I find out more about that class?  Shouldn't there be a link in
> the help file or something?

No, it means that the internal structure is regarded as private and should 
only be accessed via the methods provided (try methods(class="loess")).

You can find out more by reading the source code, but don't expect the 
authors not to change the structure at any time.

-- 
Brian D. Ripley,                  ripley at stats.ox.ac.uk
Professor of Applied Statistics,  http://www.stats.ox.ac.uk/~ripley/
University of Oxford,             Tel:  +44 1865 272861 (self)
1 South Parks Road,                     +44 1865 272866 (PA)
Oxford OX1 3TG, UK                Fax:  +44 1865 272595