[R] The use of R Commander for beginning students and newbies

[John Fox]

Dear Tom,

As you can imagine, I watched your video with interest and found it quite
impressive. I do have a couple of comments and a question.

The comments: You change a numeric ID variable into a factor with several
thousand levels. I think that it would be more natural and efficient to
assign the ID variable as the row names of the data set, which you can do
via "Data -> Active data set -> Set case names". I also noticed that you run
the Rcmdr from the RGUI MDI (multiple-document interface). This works better
than it used to, but I think that it's still preferable to use the SDI
(single-document interface).

The question: You alluded repeatedly to the necessity to close the R
graphics-device window after each plot in order "not to have the plots pile
up on each other" (a paraphrase, but I think close to what you said). I'm
not sure what you mean. In most cases, a new plot should just replace the
previous one in the graphics-device window, unless you've turned plot
recording on, in which case you should be able to page between plots. I've
never had any trouble in either case, and am interested to learn what the
problem is.

Best,
 John

-----------------------------------------------
John Fox
Senator McMaster Professor of Social Statistics
Department of Sociology
McMaster University
Hamilton, Ontario, Canada



> -----Original Message-----
> From: r-help-bounces at r-project.org [mailto:r-help-bounces at r-project.org]
> On Behalf Of Dr. Thomas W. MacFarland
> Sent: Thursday, February 07, 2013 3:25 PM
> To: r-help at r-project.org
> Subject: [R] The use of R Commander for beginning students and newbies
> 
> Everyone:
> 
> 
> 
> In the last few months I've noticed an increasing number of questions to
> this list from students who are new to the use of R and who have limited
> (in
> any) local support on R and specifically support for R syntax.
> 
> 
> 
> My text
> (http://www.springer.com/statistics/social+sciences+%26+law/book/978-1-
> 4614-
> 2133-7) from last year was specific to the use of R syntax but given
> recent
> feedback I see that perhaps those of us who teach beginning students
> need to
> give a bit more attention to R Commander and/or other GUIs, to help
> students
> build on their confidence so that we can start them out with some
> immediately successful outcomes.  Then, with experience we can move them
> over to the use of R syntax, which is certainly far more robust.
> 
> 
> 
> For beginning students, newbies, and any others who may be interested,
> I've
> opened for guest access an Elluminate-Blackboard video on the use of R
> Commander.  The URL follows and a password is not required:
> 
> 
> 
> https://mako.nova.edu/webapps/bb-collaborate-
> bb_bb60/guest.recording.launch.
> event?uid=476978d4-00c4-488e-98a3-495201e17f5f
> 
> 
> 
> The full video is about 1 hour and 20 minutes.  You can make the active
> screen (right side of the screen) larger by moving it around, minimizing
> the
> status column (left side of the screen).
> 
> 
> 
> Best wishes.
> 
> 
> 
> Tom MacFarland
> 
> 
> 
> ----------
> 
> Thomas W. MacFarland, Ed.D.
> 
> Senior Research Associate; Institutional Effectiveness and Associate
> Professor
> 
> Nova Southeastern University
> 
> Voice 954-262-5395 tommac at nova.edu
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 	[[alternative HTML version deleted]]
> 
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