From jfox at mcmaster.ca  Wed Nov  7 18:17:11 2007
From: jfox at mcmaster.ca (John Fox)
Date: Wed, 7 Nov 2007 12:17:11 -0500
Subject: [Rd] Saving Graphics File as .ps or .pdf (PR#10403)
In-Reply-To: <18225.61762.374071.459792@stat.math.ethz.ch>
Message-ID: <6buhm2$4q4upp@toip7.srvr.bell.ca>

Dear Martin, Jari, et al.,

Another relevant point (which I haven't seen in this discussion -- perhaps I
missed it) is that one can read the CHANGES and NEWS files on CRAN without
downloading or installing R-patched.

Regards,
 John


> -----Original Message-----
> From: r-devel-bounces at r-project.org 
> [mailto:r-devel-bounces at r-project.org] On Behalf Of Martin Maechler
> Sent: Wednesday, November 07, 2007 12:09 PM
> To: Jari Oksanen
> Cc: r-devel at r-project.org; Peter Dalgaard
> Subject: Re: [Rd] Saving Graphics File as .ps or .pdf (PR#10403)
> 
> >>>>> "JO" == Jari Oksanen <jari.oksanen at oulu.fi>
> >>>>>     on Wed, 07 Nov 2007 12:21:10 +0200 writes:
> 
>     JO> On Wed, 2007-11-07 at 10:51 +0100, Simone Giannerini wrote:
>     >> [snip] (this is from pd = Peter Dalgaard)
>     >> > Maybe, but given the way things have been working 
> lately, it might be
>     >> > better to emphasize
>     >> >
>     >> > (a) check the mailinglists
>     >> > (b) try R-patched
>     >> > (c) if in doubt, ask, rather than report as bug
>     >> >
>     >> > (Ideally, people would try the prerelease versions 
> and problems like
>     >> > this would be caught before the actual release, but 
> it seems that they
>     >> > prefer treating x.y.0 as a beta release...)
>     >> >
>     >> 
>     >> I am sorry but I do not agree with point (b) for the 
> very simple fact
>     >> that the average Windows user do not know how to 
> compile the source
>     >> code and might not even want to learn how to do it. 
> The point is that
>     >> since (if I am correct) the great majority of  R users 
> go Windows you
>     >> would miss an important part of potential bug reports 
> by requiring
>     >> point (b) whereas (a) and (c) would suffice IMHO.
>     >> Maybe if there were Win binaries of the prerelease 
> version available
>     >> some time before the release you would get much more 
> feedback but I am
>     >> just guessing.
> 
>     JO> First I must say that patched Windows binaries are 
> available from CRAN
>     [............]
> 
>     JO> Then I must say that I do not like this policy 
> either. I think that is
>     JO> fair to file a bug report against the latest release 
> version in good
>     JO> faith without being chastised and condemned. 
> 
> I agree in principle.
> If you do that without any of [abc] above, you do produce a 
> bit of work to at least one R-core member who has to deal 
> with the bug report (in the jitterbug archive) in addition to 
> the usual time consumption (of someone answering) which is 
> unavoidable and hence ok.
> 
> I think we as R developers should more graciously accept such 
> false positives in order to get more true positives...
> 
> 
>     JO> I know (like pd says above) that some people really do
>     JO> treat x.y.0 as beta releases: a friend of mine over here
>     JO> even refuses to install R x.x.0 versions just for this
>     JO> reason (in fact, he's pd's mate, too, but perhaps pd can
>     JO> talk him over to try x.x.0 versions). Filing a bug
>     JO> report against latest x.x.1 shouldn't be too bad either.
> 
> well, given past experience, I think people *should* adopt  
> c) in such and more cases, i.e. rather "ask" than "report a 
> bug", also in light of what you say below, but when people 
> don't, they still should be handled politely ..
> 
>     JO> I guess the problem here is that R bug reports are 
> linked to the Rd
>     JO> mailing list, and reports on "alredy fixed" bugs 
> really are irritating.
>     JO> In more loosely connected bug reporting systems you 
> simply could mark a
>     JO> bug as a duplicate of #xxxx and mark it as resolved 
> without generating
>     JO> awfully lot of mail. Then it would be humanly 
> possible to adopt a more
>     JO> neutral way of answering to people who reported bugs 
> in latest releases.
>     JO> Probably that won't happen in the current environment.
> 
>     JO> Cheers, Jari Oksanen
> 
> Martin Maechler
> 
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> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel
>



[Rd] Saving Graphics File as .ps or .pdf (PR#10403)
John Fox