[R] Hardware for a new Workstation for best performance using R

[Marc Schwartz]

On Mon, 2007-03-19 at 11:43 -0400, Gabor Grothendieck wrote:
> On 3/19/07, Thomas Lumley <tlumley at u.washington.edu> wrote:
> > On Thu, 15 Mar 2007, Andrew Perrin wrote: (in part)
> > >
> > > 2.) Yes, by all means you should use linux instead of windows. The
> > > graphics output is completely compatible with whatever applications you
> > > want to paste them into on Windows.
> >
> > This turns out not to be the case.
> >
> > It is not trivial to produce good graphics off Windows for adding to
> > Microsoft Office documents (regrettably an important case for many
> > people).  There has been much discussion of this on the R-sig-mac mailing
> > list, for example, where PNG bitmaps (at sufficiently high resolution)
> > seem to be the preferred method.
> 
> On Windows one can produce metafile output directly from R.  This
> is a Windows vector graphics format so it retains resolution under expansion
> and shrinkage and it also works well with Microsoft Office.  This
> would likely give
> superior results (maximum resolution, more flexibility in post processing,
> easier to do, interfaces better with Office) to using and transferring graphics
> from another OS, particularly png which is only bit-mapped rather than
> vector-based.

Gabor,

The problem is the the WMF/EMF formats are Windows specific, given the
proprietary nature of the format.

On non-Windows platforms (ie. Linux) which is what Thomas was referring
to, there is the libEMF library, but experience indicates it is not a
satisfactory method.

Thus, as has been discussed on r-help extensively as well over the past
several years, there is no real _cross-platform_ approach to getting
'simple' vector based graphics into Word or Powerpoint for use in
'normal' day to day operations, which typically means viewing on a
screen.

The alternative as Thomas noted, is typically to use a high-res PNG
file, which ends up being quite large and if there are several, makes
the .DOC or .PPT file quite large as well, and ultimately, impractical.

Another approach is to use EPS images generated in R, enable the
creation of lower-res bitmapped previews on import into Office, to
enable basic visual review and placement, but to then print a hard copy
or export to a PS file via a PS compatible printer/driver which will
properly render the embedded EPS image.

If required, one can convert the PS file to a PDF file, when then allows
for subsequent display using a PDF viewer in full screen mode, if a
presentation is the goal.

Until such time as SVG becomes more of a standard on multiple platforms
(even OO.org does not yet support it for import), creating vector based
images for use in Windows apps, from non-Windows systems, will continue
to be problematic.

HTH,

Marc Schwartz