Package Management

Overview

The pkg module provides six functions covering four areas:

Area Functions
Mirror configuration set_mirror()
Installation & checking inst_pkg(), check_pkg()
Updates & versions update_pkg(), pkg_version()
Exploration pkg_functions() 
library(evanverse)

Note: All code examples in this vignette are static (eval = FALSE). Output is hand-written to reflect the current implementation. Network-dependent functions (inst_pkg(), update_pkg(), pkg_version()) require an active internet connection at runtime.

1 Mirror Configuration

set_mirror() -Set CRAN and Bioconductor mirrors

Configures the CRAN and/or Bioconductor download mirrors used by all subsequent installation and update calls. The previous settings are returned invisibly, making it easy to restore them.

# Set both mirrors to Tsinghua (default)
set_mirror()
#> v CRAN mirror set to: https://mirrors.tuna.tsinghua.edu.cn/CRAN
#> v Bioconductor mirror set to: https://mirrors.tuna.tsinghua.edu.cn/bioconductor

# CRAN only
set_mirror("cran", "ustc")
#> v CRAN mirror set to: https://mirrors.ustc.edu.cn/CRAN

# Bioconductor only
set_mirror("bioc", "nju")
#> v Bioconductor mirror set to: https://mirrors.nju.edu.cn/bioconductor

Available mirrors:

Mirror CRAN Bioconductor
official v v
tuna v v
ustc v v
westlake v v
nju v v
rstudio v -
aliyun v -
sjtu v -
pku v -
hku v -
sustech v -

CRAN-only mirrors cannot be used with repo = "all":

set_mirror("all", "aliyun")
#> Error in `set_mirror()`:
#> ! Mirror "aliyun" is CRAN-only and cannot be used with `repo = "all"`.
#> i Use `set_mirror("cran", "aliyun")` instead.
#> i Shared mirrors: "official", "tuna", "ustc", "westlake", "nju"

The previous settings are returned invisibly for easy restoration:

prev <- set_mirror("cran", "tuna")
# ... do work ...
options(prev)  # restore original mirror

2 Installation & Checking

inst_pkg() -Install packages from multiple sources

Installs packages from CRAN, GitHub, Bioconductor, or a local file. Packages that are already installed are automatically skipped.

# CRAN
inst_pkg("ggplot2", source = "CRAN")
#> i Installing from CRAN: ggplot2
#> v Installation complete!

# Multiple packages at once
inst_pkg(c("dplyr", "tidyr", "purrr"), source = "CRAN")
# GitHub — basic "user/repo" format
inst_pkg("hadley/emo", source = "GitHub")

# devtools extended formats are also accepted:
# @ref pins a specific branch, tag, or SHA; #pr installs from a pull request
inst_pkg("tidyverse/ggplot2@v3.4.0", source = "GitHub")
inst_pkg("r-lib/cli#123",            source = "GitHub")
# Bioconductor
inst_pkg("DESeq2",    source = "Bioconductor")
inst_pkg("scRNAseq",  source = "Bioconductor")
# Local file
inst_pkg(source = "Local", path = "mypackage_1.0.0.tar.gz")

path is required for local installs — omitting it raises an error immediately:

inst_pkg(source = "Local")
#> Error in `inst_pkg()`:
#> ! Must provide `path` for local installation.

Already-installed packages are skipped rather than reinstalled:

inst_pkg("ggplot2", source = "CRAN")
#> i Package ggplot2 is already installed. Skipped.
#> v All packages already installed.

check_pkg() -Check installation status

Returns a tibble reporting whether each package is installed. Pass auto_install = TRUE to install missing packages automatically; a single failure does not interrupt the remaining checks.

check_pkg("ggplot2", source = "CRAN")
#> # A tibble: 1 × 4
#>   package name    installed source
#>   <chr>   <chr>   <lgl>     <chr>
#> 1 ggplot2 ggplot2 TRUE      CRAN
check_pkg(c("ggplot2", "fakepkg123"), source = "CRAN")
#> v Installed: ggplot2
#> ! Missing: fakepkg123
#> # A tibble: 2 × 4
#>   package    name       installed source
#>   <chr>      <chr>      <lgl>     <chr>
#> 1 ggplot2    ggplot2    TRUE      CRAN
#> 2 fakepkg123 fakepkg123 FALSE     CRAN

For GitHub packages the package column holds the full "user/repo" string while name holds just the package name:

check_pkg("r-lib/cli", source = "GitHub")
#> # A tibble: 1 × 4
#>   package   name  installed source
#>   <chr>     <chr> <lgl>     <chr>
#> 1 r-lib/cli cli   TRUE      GitHub

Auto-install missing packages in one call:

check_pkg(c("ggplot2", "fakepkg123"), source = "CRAN", auto_install = TRUE)
#> v Installed: ggplot2
#> ! Missing: fakepkg123
#> i Installing from CRAN: fakepkg123
#> ...

3 Updates & Versions

update_pkg() -Update installed packages

Supports three update modes: full update across all sources, source-specific bulk update, or targeted update of named packages.

# Update all CRAN + Bioconductor packages
update_pkg()
#> i Checking for BiocManager updates...
#> i Upgrading Bioconductor packages to version 3.21...
#> v Bioconductor upgraded to version 3.21.
#> i Updating all CRAN packages...
#> v Update complete!
# CRAN only
update_pkg(source = "CRAN")

# Bioconductor only (full Bioc upgrade)
update_pkg(source = "Bioconductor")
# Specific packages
update_pkg("ggplot2",            source = "CRAN")
update_pkg("hadley/ggplot2",     source = "GitHub")
update_pkg("DESeq2",             source = "Bioconductor")

Providing pkg with source = "Bioconductor" updates only that package — it does not trigger a full Bioconductor upgrade.

Combining pkg with source = "all" is an error:

update_pkg("ggplot2")
#> Error in `update_pkg()`:
#> ! Must specify `source` when providing `pkg`.

pkg_version() -Check installed and latest versions

Returns a data frame with columns package, version (installed), latest (newest available), and source (CRAN, Bioconductor, or GitHub). Source detection is automatic.

If the Bioconductor mirror is unreachable, pkg_version() degrades gracefully: it emits a warning and treats all Bioc packages as “Not Found”. Switch to the official mirror and retry: set_mirror("bioc", "official").

pkg_version(c("ggplot2", "dplyr"))
#>   package version latest source
#> 1 ggplot2   3.4.4  3.5.0   CRAN
#> 2   dplyr   1.1.4  1.1.4   CRAN

Uninstalled or unknown packages return NA for version and "Not Found" for source:

pkg_version("nonexistentpkg")
#>        package version latest      source
#> 1 nonexistentpkg    <NA>   <NA> Not Found

GitHub-installed packages report the installed commit SHA and the remote reference:

pkg_version("emo")
#>   package version  latest                      source
#> 1     emo   0.0.1 a1b2c3d GitHub (hadley/emo@master)

Duplicate package names in the input are silently deduplicated:

pkg_version(c("ggplot2", "ggplot2"))
#>   package version latest source
#> 1 ggplot2   3.4.4  3.5.0   CRAN

4 Exploration

pkg_functions() -List exported functions

Returns an alphabetically sorted character vector of exported symbols from any installed package. Use key to filter by a case-insensitive keyword.

pkg_functions("evanverse")
#>  [1] "check_pkg"       "compile_palettes" "create_palette"  "df2list"
#>  [5] "df2vect"         "file_info"        "file_ls"         "file_tree"
#>  ...
# Filter by keyword (case-insensitive)
pkg_functions("evanverse", key = "palette")
#> [1] "compile_palettes" "create_palette"   "get_palette"
#> [4] "list_palettes"    "palette_gallery"   "preview_palette"
#> [7] "remove_palette"

pkg_functions("stats", key = "test")
#> [1] "ansari.test"     "bartlett.test"   "binom.test"
#> [4] "chisq.test"      "cor.test"        "fisher.test"
#> ...

An unmatched keyword returns an empty vector rather than an error:

pkg_functions("stats", key = "zzzzzz")
#> character(0)

Querying an uninstalled package raises an informative error:

pkg_functions("somefakepkg")
#> Error in `pkg_functions()`:
#> ! Package `somefakepkg` is not installed.

5 A Combined Workflow

The functions compose naturally for setting up a new analysis environment. The example below configures mirrors, checks a dependency list, installs missing packages, then verifies versions are up to date.

library(evanverse)

# 1. Switch to a fast local mirror
set_mirror("all", "tuna")
#> v CRAN mirror set to: https://mirrors.tuna.tsinghua.edu.cn/CRAN
#> v Bioconductor mirror set to: https://mirrors.tuna.tsinghua.edu.cn/bioconductor

# 2. Define required packages
cran_pkgs <- c("ggplot2", "dplyr", "purrr", "readxl")
bioc_pkgs <- c("DESeq2", "clusterProfiler")

# 3. Check what is already installed
cran_status <- check_pkg(cran_pkgs, source = "CRAN")
bioc_status <- check_pkg(bioc_pkgs, source = "Bioconductor")

# 4. Install only missing packages
missing_cran <- cran_status$name[!cran_status$installed]
missing_bioc <- bioc_status$name[!bioc_status$installed]

if (length(missing_cran) > 0) inst_pkg(missing_cran, source = "CRAN")
if (length(missing_bioc) > 0) inst_pkg(missing_bioc, source = "Bioconductor")

# 5. Verify versions -flag anything outdated
versions <- pkg_version(c(cran_pkgs, bioc_pkgs))
outdated <- versions[!is.na(versions$version) &
                     !is.na(versions$latest)   &
                     versions$version != versions$latest, ]
outdated
#>      package version latest source
#> 1    ggplot2   3.4.4  3.5.0   CRAN
#> 2     DESeq2  1.38.0 1.40.0   Bioconductor

# 6. Update only the outdated ones
if (nrow(outdated) > 0) {
  cran_out <- outdated$package[outdated$source == "CRAN"]
  bioc_out <- outdated$package[outdated$source == "Bioconductor"]
  if (length(cran_out) > 0) update_pkg(cran_out, source = "CRAN")
  if (length(bioc_out) > 0) update_pkg(bioc_out, source = "Bioconductor")
}

# 7. Confirm evanverse exports look right
pkg_functions("evanverse", key = "pkg")
#> [1] "check_pkg"    "inst_pkg"     "pkg_functions" "pkg_version"  "update_pkg"

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