What Is R

What is R? How do I use it?
R acts as an alternative to traditional statistical packages such as SPSS, SAS, and Stata such that
it is an extensible, open-source language and computing environment for Windows, Macintosh,
UNIX, and Linux platforms. Such software allows for the user to freely distribute, study, change,
and improve the software under the Free Software Foundation's GNU General Public License. It
is a free implementation of the S programming language, which was originally created and
distributed by Bell Labs. However, most code written in S will run successfully in the R
environment. R performs a wide variety of basic to advanced statistical and graphical techniques
at little to no cost to the user. These advantages over other statistical software encourage the
growing use of R in cutting edge social science research.
Where can I obtain R?
Installation files for Windows, Mac, and Linux can be found at the website for the
Comprehensive R Archive Network, http://cran.r-project.org/. The site also contains
documentation for downloading and installing the software on different operating systems. There
is no cost for downloading and using R.
Where can I find more information on R?
Books
Braun, W. and Murdoch, D. (2007). A First Course in Statistical Programming with R.

Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press.
Chambers, J. M. (1998). Programming with Data: A Guide to the S Language. Murray Hill, NJ:
Bell Laboratories.
Dalgaard, P. (2008). Introductory Statistics with R (2nd edition). New York: Springer.
Everitt, B., and Hothorn, T. (2006). A Handbook of Statistical Analyses Using R. Boca Raton,
FL: Chapman & Hall/CRC.
Faraway, J. J. (2005). Linear Models with R. Boca Raton, FL: Chapman & Hall/CRC.
Faraway, J. J. (2006). Extending the Linear Model with R: Generalized Linear, Mixed Effects
and Nonparametric Regression Models. Boca Raton, FL: Chapman & Hall/CRC.
Fox, J. (2002). An R and S-Plus Companion to Applied Regression. Thousand Oaks, CA : Sage
Publications.
Muenchen, R. A. (2009). R for SAS and SPSS Users. Springer Series in Statistics and
Computing. New York: Springer.
Murrell, P. (2005). R Graphics. Boca Raton, FL: Chapman & Hall/CRC.
Pinheiro, J. C. and Bates, D. M. (2004). Mixed Effects Models in S and S-Plus. New York:
Springer.
Spector, P. (2000). Data Manipulation with R. New York: Springer.
Venables, W. N., and Ripley, B. D. (2002). Modern Applied Statistics with S. Fourth Edition.
New York: Springer.
Zuur, A. F., Ieno, E. N., and Meesters, E. H. W. G. (to be published 2009). A Beginner's Guide
to R. Use R. New York: Springer.
Web Resources
Quick-R site
The Omega Project for Statistical Computing
The R Project for Statistical Computing
The R Journal
Seminal Journal article
Ihaka, R., and Gentleman, R. (1996). R: A language for data analysis and graphics. Journal of
Computational and Graphical Statistics, 5(3):299-314.
References:
 What is R?
How do I read ICPSR data into R?

We have a brief tutorial available on how to read data into R.
Can I use R without having to learn the details of the R

language?
Yes (at least for the basics), there are a number of "front ends" that have been constructed in
order to make it easier for users to interact with the R statistical computing environment. For
example, a graphical user interface (or "GUI") allows the analyst to carry out data analysis tasks
by selecting items from menus and lists, rather than entering commands.
One such GUI is the R Commander, written by John Fox. The R Commander is accessed by
installing and loading the Rcmdr package within R. The R Commander provides an easy-to-use,
menu-based system for loading data into R, manipulating data values, performing statistical
analyses, creating graphical displays, and carrying out diagnostic tests on statistical models.
Documentation for the R Commander is available on John Fox's website and in the following
paper:
Fox, John. 2005. "The R Commander: A Basic-Statistics Graphical User Interface to R." Journal
of Statistical Software 14(9).
There are several other GUI systems, in addition to the R Commander, for interacting with R. A
useful discussion of R and GUIs, along with a list of current GUI projects for R is available.
The advantage provided by the R Commander or another GUI is that the user does not need to
learn a language in order to carry out his or her analysis. Instead, each step is taken by making
one or more selections from a menu of available options. The disadvantage of interacting with
the R environment through a GUI is that the course of the analysis is limited to those actions that
have been programmed into the GUI. Thus, one could argue that using a GUI removes much of
the flexibility that is inherent in the R environment.
In order to overcome the preceding limitation, the R Commander and most other GUIs allow the
user to employ both methods of interacting with the environment within a single R session. For
example, one could invoke the R Commander, and use its GUI to read the contents of an external
file and create an R data frame. For many types of analyses, other features of the R Commander
could be used to estimate model parameters, construct graphical displays, and so on. But, if the
user wanted to carry out a task that is not available in the R Commander (e.g., a
multidimensional scaling analysis), then the data frame created in the GUI could still be treated
like any other currently defined R object (say as an argument to a function or the target of an
assignment) on the R command line. In this manner, a user could exploit the advantages of both
the GUI and the command-line interface.

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What Is R

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What is R? How do I use it?

Where can I obtain R?

Where can I find more information on R?

Braun, W. and Murdoch, D. (2007). A First Course in Statistical Programming with R.

Spector, P. (2000). Data Manipulation with R. New York: Springer.

The Omega Project for Statistical Computing

The R Project for Statistical Computing

Seminal Journal article

How do I read ICPSR data into R?

Can I use R without having to learn the details of the R

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