Learning R Programming: Language, tools, and practical techniques

Key Features

• Explore the R language from basic types and data structures to advanced topics
• Learn how to tackle programming problems and explore both functional and object-oriented programming techniques
• Learn how to address the core problems of programming in R

Book Description

R is a high-level functional language that is used for statistical computing, and has now become the most used language for data science and statistics. R programming heavily involves data processing, and it can be a challenge to program in R for those who are unfamiliar with the behaviors of the R language. Through this book, you will develop a universal and consistent understanding of R as a programming language along with its vast set of tools on offer. You will learn the best practices to boost your productivity and develop a deeper understanding of working with data.

We'll explain the important behaviors of R's commonly used data structures and data processing techniques in practice. We'll introduce popular R packages that will boost your productivity from the offset. On the journey, we'll help you get familiar with the basics of R, then we'll deep dive into various programming techniques and paradigms. Next we'll go through advanced topics to get a deeper understanding of R's behavior, while performing common such as data analysis, databases, web scraping, high performance computing, and writing documents. Throughout the book, we introduce the commonly used tools to enhance productivity.

By the end of the book, you will feel much more confident about programing in R, expressing their logic, and solving problems with the right techniques.

What you will learn

• Get to know high performance computing techniques such as parallel computing and Rcpp
• Use web scraping techniques to extract information
• Explore the basic functions in R (workspace, package, object, logical operations, string manipulation, and more)
• Create RMarkdown, an interactive app with Shiny, DiagramR, interactive charts, ggvis, and more
• Work with data in R including basic statistics, data mining, data visualization, root solving, and optimization
• See Meta-programming techniques in R: such as symbol, call, formula, and expression
• Get to grips with object-oriented programming in R: including the S3, S4, RC, and R6 systems
• Get acquainted with scoping and R's evaluation model

Kun Ren has been using R for nearly 4 years and has been very intensively (more than 8-10 hours every day) working on useful R packages that the community does not offer yet. Kun also contributes to packages developed by other authors and reports issues to make things work better. Kun is also a frequent speaker at R conferences in China and has given multiple talks. Kun also has a great social media presence. He has also contributed substantially to various projects, which is evident from his GitHub account.