Note that by using built-in functions, the only thing you need to worry about is how to effectively communicate the correct input arguments (arglist) and manage the return value/s (if any). The code in between the curly braces is the body of the function. In R, a function is defined with the construct:

A function is a piece of code written to carry out a specified task it may accept arguments or parameters (or not) and it may return one or more values (or not!).

# An example of computing the mean with variablesĪlmost everything in R is done through functions. Use the assignment operator <- to create new variables. R has a wide variety of data types including scalars, vectors (numerical, character, logical), matrices, data frames, and lists. Note that binary operators work on vectors and matrices as well as scalars. R's binary and logical operators will look very familiar to programmers. Graphic User InterfacesĪside from the built in R console, RStudio is the most popular R code editor, and it interfaces with R for Windows, MacOS, and Linux platforms. At the end of an R session, the user can save an image of the current workspace that is automatically reloaded the next time R is started.

The workspace is your current R working environment and includes any user-defined objects (vectors, matrices, data frames, lists, functions). The user enters commands at the prompt ( > by default) and each command is executed one at a time. StartupĪfter R is downloaded and installed, simply find and launch R from your Applications folder. Software can be downloaded from The Comprehensive R Archive Network (CRAN). R is available for Linux, MacOS, and Windows.

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