[R] what is the function naming convention?

[Duncan Murdoch]

On 12-11-04 8:16 AM, Bretschneider SIG-R wrote:
> Dear R people,
>
>
>
> In typing names of functions (built in or from a package) I often guess wrong, and have to look the name up.
> In other words, I don't understand the logic in naming functions (if there is any):

R and its packages have been written by hundreds (thousands?) of people, 
and they do not use consistent naming conventions.  Perhaps a convention 
should have been enforced from the beginning, but it's too late now.

Duncan Murdoch

>
> -  most names are plain, lower case:  cos,  plot,  sapply,  t,  toupper,  unserialize,  (etc)
>
> -  some are capitalized:  Filter,  Machine,  Map,  NCOL,  RNGversion,  T  (etc)
>
> -  many are dotted:  as.complex,  as.data.frame.array,  merge.data.frame,  write.dcf  (etc)
>
> The manual "Creating R Packages" states that it depends on the classes and instances. I couldn't find more hints.
>
> And there's more:
>
> -  using underscore characters:  check_tzones,  Cstack_info,  R_system_version  (etc)
>
> -  using interCapping:  closeAllConnections,  rawToChar,  rowSums,  toString,  tryCatch,  writeLines  (etc)
>
> -  using dots and intercapping:  as.Date,  julian.Date,  toString.default  (etc)
>
>
>
> So, an entire zoo of function names.
> Did I miss a system, or is it arbitrary (within the set of accepted characters) ?
> What is the best way to name one's own functions?
>
> Thanks in advance,
>
>
>
> Franklin Bretschneider
> ----------------------------
> Utrecht University
> Dept Biology
> Kruytgebouw W711
> Padualaan 8
> 3584 CH Utrecht
> The Netherlands
>
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