[R] How to understand the mentality behind tidyverse and ggplot2?

[Roy Mendelssohn - NOAA Federal]

Personally I liked two workshops Thomas Lin Pedersen gave:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h29g21z0a68
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0m4yywqNPVY&t=5219s

-Roy

> On Nov 18, 2020, at 3:24 PM, John via R-help <r-help using r-project.org> wrote:
> 
> On Tue, 17 Nov 2020 12:43:21 -0500
> C W <tmrsg11 using gmail.com> wrote:
> 
>> Dear R list,
>> 
>> I am an old-school R user. I use apply(), with(), and which() in base
>> package instead of filter(), select(), separate() in Tidyverse. The
>> idea of pipeline (i.e. %>%) my code was foreign to me for a while. It
>> makes the code shorter, but sometimes less readable?
>> 
>> With ggplot2, I just don't understand how it is organized. Take this
>> code:
>> 
>>> ggplot(diamonds, aes(x=carat, y=price)) +
>>> geom_point(aes(color=cut)) +  
>> geom_smooth()
>> 
>> There are three plus signs. How do you know when to "add" and what to
>> "add"? I've seen more plus signs.
>> 
>> To me, aes() stands for aesthetic, meaning looks. So, anything
>> related to looks like points and smooth should be in aes().
>> Apparently, it's not the case.
>> 
>> So, how does ggplot2 work? Could someone explain this for an
>> old-school R user?
>> 
>> Thank you!
>> 
> A really short form is to consider that ggplot2 syntax defines an
> object, and then additional simply adds to it, which is what all the
> plus signs are.  Ideally, you can start a ggplot call with a
> designation of a target:
> 
> Instead of:
> ggplot(diamonds, aes(x=carat, y=price)) + ...
> 
> use something like"
> 
> fig1 <- ggplot(diamonds, aes(x=carat, y=price)) + ...
> 
> This creates an environment object that can then be further modified.
> Learning the syntax is a chore, but the output tends to be fine,
> especially for publications and final graphics. One the other hand it's
> slower and fussier than some of the more traditional approaches, which
> are what I would prefer for EDA. 
> 
> JWDougherty
> 
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**********************
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**********************
Roy Mendelssohn
Supervisory Operations Research Analyst
NOAA/NMFS
Environmental Research Division
Southwest Fisheries Science Center
***Note new street address***
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Santa Cruz, CA 95060
Phone: (831)-420-3666
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e-mail: Roy.Mendelssohn using noaa.gov www: https://www.pfeg.noaa.gov/

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