R Weekly Highlights

Creating your own race to a programming finish line with a hidden gem in mirai, the lowdown on using Generative AI for data visualization with more than a few surprises, and going from start to finish with a Shiny app created under the BDD mindset.
Episode Links

• This week's curator: Sam Parmar - @[email protected] (Mastodon) & @parmsam_ (X/Twitter)
• Aaaaand… they’re off!
• Generative AI for Data Visualisation
• Behavior-Driven Development in R Shiny: A Step-By-Step Example
• Entire issue available at rweekly.org/2025-W42

Supplement Resources

• DataBot https://positron.posit.co/databot.html

Supporting the show

• Use the contact page at https://serve.podhome.fm/custompage/r-weekly-highlights/contact to send us your feedback
• R-Weekly Highlights on the Podcastindex.org - You can send a boost into the show directly in the Podcast Index. First, top-up with Alby, and then head over to the R-Weekly Highlights podcast entry on the index.
• A new way to think about value: https://value4value.info
• Get in touch with us on social media
  • Eric Nantz: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @rpodcast.bsky.social (BlueSky) and @theRcast (X/Twitter) 
  • Mike Thomas: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @mike-thomas.bsky.social (BlueSky), and @mike_ketchbrook (X/Twitter) 

Music credits powered by OCRemix

• Warriors of Light - Final Fantasy - Darangen - https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR01339
• Honky Town - Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars - Wiesty, XPRTNovice - https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR03535

The ducks have made their presence felt in the world of databases, but now you can take a dip in a new Ducklake all within R! If you ever felt someone should write a book on the many ways you can slidecraft Quarto presentations, we have good news for you. Lastly, a spectacular series on harnessing the power of LLMs in your Shiny apps concludes with a powerful and very relevant use case to help review your next presentation slides.


Plus … a popular segment returns


Episode Links

• This week's curator: Eric Nantz: @[email protected] (Mastodon) & @rpodcast.bsky.social (BlueSky) & @theRcast (X/Twitter)
• Jumping in the Ducklake with nothing but R on
• Slidecrafting - Making beautiful slides with reveal.js and Quarto
• The Shiny side of LLMs Part 3
• Entire issue available at rweekly.org/2025-W40

Supporting the show

• Use the contact page at https://serve.podhome.fm/custompage/r-weekly-highlights/contact to send us your feedback
• R-Weekly Highlights on the Podcastindex.org - You can send a boost into the show directly in the Podcast Index. First, top-up with Alby, and then head over to the R-Weekly Highlights podcast entry on the index.
• A new way to think about value: https://value4value.info
• Get in touch with us on social media
  • Eric Nantz: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @rpodcast.bsky.social (BlueSky) and @theRcast (X/Twitter)
  • Mike Thomas: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @mike-thomas.bsky.social (BlueSky), and @mike_ketchbrook (X/Twitter) 

Music credits powered by OCRemix

• Relm's Weepy Loop - Final Fantasy 6 - MkVaff - https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR00178
• Serenity & Grace - Chrono Cross - timaeus222 - https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR04143

Fresh off an amazing experience at posit::conf(2025), the R Weekly Highlights podcast is back with episode 211! Eric and Mike share their experiences at the conference and then dive into an amazing collection of highlights. We learn about a myriad of packages to programmatically write and parse markdown documents, initial impressions with vibe-coding an R package to learn Japanese, and the immense lengths the R-Exams project is taking to clean up messy scans of exam papers.

Episode Links

• This week's curator: Jon Carroll - @[email protected] (Mastodon) & @jonocarroll.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy (Bluesky) & @carroll_jono (X/Twitter)
• All the Ways to Programmatically Edit or Parse R Markdown / Quarto Documents
• I Vibe Coded an R Package
• Quality Control for Scanned Multiple-Choice Exams
• Entire issue available at rweekly.org/2025-W39

Supplement Resources

• Mike's presentation slides: Building Multilingual Data Science Teams https://ketchbrookanalytics.github.io/multilingual-data-science-presentation
• Eric's presentation slides: Introducing Shinystate - Launching Shiny collaboration to new heights https://rpodcast.github.io/shinystate-positconf2025/#/titleslide

Supporting the show

• Use the contact page at https://serve.podhome.fm/custompage/r-weekly-highlights/contact to send us your feedback
• R-Weekly Highlights on the Podcastindex.org - You can send a boost into the show directly in the Podcast Index. First, top-up with Alby, and then head over to the R-Weekly Highlights podcast entry on the index.
• A new way to think about value: https://value4value.info
• Get in touch with us on social media
  • Eric Nantz: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @rpodcast.bsky.social (BlueSky) and @theRcast (X/Twitter) 
  • Mike Thomas: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @mike-thomas.bsky.social (BlueSky), and @mike_ketchbrook (X/Twitter) 

Music credits powered by OCRemix

• Twoson Hits the Road - EarthBound - djpretzel - https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR01427
• Gemini Salsa - Mega Man 3 - MkVaff - https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR00146

In episode 210 of the R Weekly Highlights podcast: The Positron IDE has officially been released after two years of intense development, and we share what excites us the most. Plus a new tool in your Shiny testing toolbox to bridge the gap between server-side and dynamic updating the user interface, and an entry point to making that URL of your Shiny app set inputs on the fly, a topic one of your hosts has been investigating for quite some time!
Episode Links

• This week's curator: Colin Fay - @[email protected] (Mastodon) & @colinfay.bsky.social (Bluesky) & @_ColinFay (X/Twitter)
• Announcing Positron, a new Data Science IDE
• {shinytesters}: Updating Inputs in testServer
• Adding Shiny app’s parameters to the URL
• Entire issue available at rweekly.org/2025-W34

Supplement Resources

• The Test Set Podcast https://posit.co/thetestset/
• Continue extension https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=Continue.continue
• shinytesters getting started vignette https://ashbaldry.github.io/shinytesters/articles/shinytesters.html
• Eric's shinystate R package https://github.com/rpodcast/shinystate

Supporting the show

• Use the contact page at https://serve.podhome.fm/custompage/r-weekly-highlights/contact to send us your feedback
• R-Weekly Highlights on the Podcastindex.org - You can send a boost into the show directly in the Podcast Index. First, top-up with Alby, and then head over to the R-Weekly Highlights podcast entry on the index.
• A new way to think about value: https://value4value.info
• Get in touch with us on social media
  • Eric Nantz: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @rpodcast.bsky.social (BlueSky) and @theRcast (X/Twitter)
  • Mike Thomas: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @mike-thomas.bsky.social (BlueSky), and @mike_ketchbrook (X/Twitter) 

Music credits powered by OCRemix

• Cliff the Great Crusader - Suikoden - Trenthian - https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR01268
• Brinstar Bonsai Garden - Super Metroid - Red Tailed Fox - https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR01473

In episode 209 of R Weekly Highlights we learn ways you can pinpoint just what is slowing down your R code, a novel framing for testing your next plumber API, and the adventures in recreating a NY Times chart entirely with ggplot2.
Episode Links

• This week's curator: Jon Carroll - @[email protected] (Mastodon) & @jonocarroll.fosstodon.org.ap.brid.gy (Bluesky) & @carroll_jono (X/Twitter)
• Speed Testing Code: Three Levels
• Testing your Plumber APIs from R
• Copy the Pros: How to Recreate this NYTimes Chart in R
• Entire issue available at rweekly.org/2025-W31

Supplement Resources

• Add links discussed in the episode (in place of this sentence)
• Eric and Mike's 2023 Shiny in Production workshop https://posit-conf-2023.github.io/shiny-r-prod/
• Jakub's R test gallery https://jakubsobolewski.com/r-tests-gallery/
• plumber2 - Easy and Powerful Webservers in R https://posit-dev.github.io/plumber2/
• Push straight to prod API development with R and Tensorflow at T-Mobile https://posit.co/resources/videos/push-straight-to-prod-api-development-with-r-and-tensorflow-at-tmobile/
• VCR R package by Scott Chamberlain https://github.com/ropensci/vcr/
• GitHub repository with Spencer's ggplot2 code https://github.com/Pecners/make_that_chart

Supporting the show

• Use the contact page at https://serve.podhome.fm/custompage/r-weekly-highlights/contact to send us your feedback
• R-Weekly Highlights on the Podcastindex.org - You can send a boost into the show directly in the Podcast Index. First, top-up with Alby, and then head over to the R-Weekly Highlights podcast entry on the index.
• A new way to think about value: https://value4value.info
• Get in touch with us on social media
  • Eric Nantz: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @rpodcast.bsky.social (BlueSky) and @theRcast (X/Twitter) 
  • Mike Thomas: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @mike-thomas.bsky.social (BlueSky), and @mike_ketchbrook (X/Twitter) 

Music credits powered by OCRemix

• Digital Saṃsāra - Genshin Impact - OceansAndrew - https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR04775
• Big Earl Funk - ToeJam & Earl - Zach Chapman, Ian Martyn, newmajoe, Ronin Op F, TheManPF - https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR04785

In episode 208 of R Weekly Highlights, the LLM train keeps moving along in the data science community: First impressions of the new Positron Assistant for code completion and basic package development, plus a friendly app for exploring the upcoming posit::conf(2025) agenda created by one of our talented R Weekly curators!
Episode Links

• This week's curator: Jon Calder - @[email protected] (Mastodon) & @jonmcalder (X/Twitter) * @[email protected]
• Positron Assistant: GitHub Copilot and Claude-Powered Agentic Coding in R
• Your LLM-powered guide to the posit::conf(2025) agenda
• Entire issue available at rweekly.org/2025-W30

Supplement Resources

• Positron Assistant https://positron.posit.co/assistant
• posit::conf(2025) Agenda Chat Bot https://posit-ai-posit-conf-agenda-chat.share.connect.posit.cloud/

Supporting the show

• Use the contact page at https://serve.podhome.fm/custompage/r-weekly-highlights/contact to send us your feedback
• R-Weekly Highlights on the Podcastindex.org - You can send a boost into the show directly in the Podcast Index. First, top-up with Alby, and then head over to the R-Weekly Highlights podcast entry on the index.
• A new way to think about value: https://value4value.info
• Get in touch with us on social media
  • Eric Nantz: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @rpodcast.bsky.social (BlueSky) and @theRcast (X/Twitter)
  • Mike Thomas: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @mike-thomas.bsky.social (BlueSky), and @mike_ketchbrook (X/Twitter) 

Music credits powered by OCRemix

• The Quick and the Blue - Mega Man 2 - The Megas - https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR02090

It's been far too long since our last episode of R Weekly Highlights, but we are finally back with episode 207! In this episode we learn about novel ways to automate fancy Quarto content, how we can be on our best behavior with behavior-driven-development, and finding that pesky portion of data breaking long data pipelines with a magical debugging technique. Plus one of your hosts could not resist a hot take or two!
Episode Links

• This week's curator: Ryo Nakagawara - @[email protected] (Mastodon) & @rbyryo.bsky.social (Bluesky) & @R_by_Ryo) (X/Twitter)
• Generating quarto syntax within R
• An Introduction to Behavior-Driven Development in R
• Dive()ing into the hunt #rstats
• Entire issue available at rweekly.org/2025-W28

Supplement Resources

• Add links discussed in the episode (in place of this sentence)
• {quartose}: Dynamically Generate Quarto Syntax https://quartose.djnavarro.net/
• Cucumber: write automated tests in plain language https://cucumber.io/
• {cucumber}: An implementation of the Cucumber testing framework in R https://jakubsobolewski.com/cucumber/
• Shiny App-Packages https://mjfrigaard.github.io/shiny-app-pkgs/

Supporting the show

• Use the contact page at https://serve.podhome.fm/custompage/r-weekly-highlights/contact to send us your feedback
• R-Weekly Highlights on the Podcastindex.org - You can send a boost into the show directly in the Podcast Index. First, top-up with Alby, and then head over to the R-Weekly Highlights podcast entry on the index.
• A new way to think about value: https://value4value.info
• Get in touch with us on social media
  • Eric Nantz: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @rpodcast.bsky.social (BlueSky) and @theRcast (X/Twitter)
  • Mike Thomas: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @mike-thomas.bsky.social (BlueSky), and @mike_ketchbrook (X/Twitter) 

Music credits powered by OCRemix

• Chillin' with the Bros - Super Smash Bros - Jamphibious - https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR03072
• Flames of Darkness - Mega Man ZX - Vyper - https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR01966

The summer schedule has been crazy, but we finally have a new episode of R Weekly Highlights! In this episode: How the new shiny2docker package eases your entry to the world of containers, the power of WebAssembly in full ggplot2 glory, and how the latest solution for speeding up R code draws upon a classic computing language you may not expect.
Episode Links

• This week's curator: Eric Nantz: @[email protected] (Mastodon) & @rpodcast.bsky.social (BlueSky) & @theRcast (X/Twitter)
• Containerizing Shiny Apps with {shiny2docker}: A Step-by-Step Guide
• ggplot2 layer explorer
• {quickr} 0.1.0: Compiler for R
• Entire issue available at rweekly.org/2025-W24

Supplement Resources

• {attachment} - Tools to deal with dependencies in scripts, Rmd, and packages https://thinkr-open.github.io/attachment/
• The Rocker Project - Docker Containers for the R Environment https://rocker-project.org/
• r2u - CRAN as Ubuntu binaries https://eddelbuettel.github.io/r2u/
• ShinyProxy https://shinyproxy.io/
• GitHub repository for ggplot2 Explorer https://github.com/yjunechoe/ggplot2-layer-explorer

Supporting the show

• Use the contact page at https://serve.podhome.fm/custompage/r-weekly-highlights/contact to send us your feedback
• R-Weekly Highlights on the Podcastindex.org - You can send a boost into the show directly in the Podcast Index. First, top-up with Alby, and then head over to the R-Weekly Highlights podcast entry on the index.
• A new way to think about value: https://value4value.info
• Get in touch with us on social media
  • Eric Nantz: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @rpodcast.bsky.social (BlueSky) and @theRcast (X/Twitter)
  • Mike Thomas: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @mike-thomas.bsky.social (BlueSky), and @mike_ketchbrook (X/Twitter) 

Music credits powered by OCRemix

• WillRocky - Return All Robots! - WillRock - https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR02280
• The Unnamed Frontier - Metroid II: Return of Samus - Pyro Paper Planes, Viking Guitar - https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR02892

Have you wanted a chance to rewrite your own history? With Git, you certainly can! We learn that and other amazing tips to supercharge your version control skills. Plus a promising new package to let your Shiny app users make the call on their preferred layouts, and how mocking is not something to dread when you build unit tests interacting with external services.
Episode Links

• This week's curator: Jon Calder - @[email protected] (Mastodon) & @jonmcalder (X/Twitter)
• Hack your way to a good Git history (SLC-RUG May) (slides)
• Introducing dockViewR 0.1.0: a layout manager for R and Shiny.
• Mock Them All: Simulate to Better Test with testthat
• Entire issue available at rweekly.org/2025-W21

Supplement Resources

• {saperpolette} Exercises (playgrounds) to go with oh (****) Git and beyond, for R users https://docs.ropensci.org/saperlipopette/
• No code data analysis with {blockr} (R/Pharma 2024 Workshop) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQvTQqcmadY
• Prototype Shiny apps in Excalidraw with Shinydraw https://github.com/MikeJohnPage/shinydraw
• Multi-language pipelines with rixpress https://brodrigues.co/posts/2025-05-13-test_rixpress.html
• R/Medicine 2025 https://rconsortium.github.io/RMedicine_website/
• Fonts in R https://www.tidyverse.org/blog/2025/05/fonts-in-r/

Supporting the show

• Use the contact page at https://serve.podhome.fm/custompage/r-weekly-highlights/contact to send us your feedback
• R-Weekly Highlights on the Podcastindex.org - You can send a boost into the show directly in the Podcast Index. First, top-up with Alby, and then head over to the R-Weekly Highlights podcast entry on the index.
• A new way to think about value: https://value4value.info
• Get in touch with us on social media
  • Eric Nantz: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @rpodcast.bsky.social (BlueSky) and @theRcast (X/Twitter)
  • Mike Thomas: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @mike-thomas.bsky.social (BlueSky), and @mike_ketchbrook (X/Twitter) 

Music credits powered by OCRemix

• Dovahkiin in Jamaica- The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim - M Benson, Ben Cureton - https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR04390
• Crysis Crystal - Megaman 9: Back in Blue - k-wix - https://backinblue.ocremix.org/music.php

Episode 204 of R Weekly Highlights is jam-packed with four highlights! We discuss the recent improvements to the recipes package in the tidymodels suite, Nicola Rennie's adventures with this year's 30 day chart challenge, going back to math school with Jon Carroll's latest explorations in digit rotation, and our picks out of the excellent collection of the top 40 R packages for March.
Episode Links

• This week's curator: Batool Almarzouq - @batoolmm.bsky.social (Bluesky) & @batool664 (X/Twitter)
• recipes 1.3.0
• 30 Day Chart Challenge 2025
• Rotation with Modulo
• March 2025 Top 40 New CRAN Packages
• Entire issue available at rweekly.org/2025-W19

Supplement Resources

• {recipes} Pipeable steps for feature engineering and data preprocessing to prepare for modeling https://recipes.tidymodels.org/
• tidymodels books https://www.tidymodels.org/books/index.html
• Nicola's 30 day chart challenge browser app https://nrennie.rbind.io/30DayChartChallenge/
• {tidyplots} https://tidyplots.org
• {echarts4r} https://echarts4r.john-coene.com
• https://www.reddit.com/r/hockey/comments/1kfd57j/oc_round_2_matchups_are_set_lego_style/
• Using {autodb} https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/autodb/vignettes/autodb.html
• {kitesquare} Kite-Square plots for contingency tables https://github.com/HUGLeipzig/kitesquare
• {EQRN} Extreme Quantile Regression Neural Networks for Risk Forecasting https://cran.r-project.org/package=EQRN https://opasche.github.io/EQRN/

Supporting the show

• Use the contact page at https://serve.podhome.fm/custompage/r-weekly-highlights/contact to send us your feedback
• R-Weekly Highlights on the Podcastindex.org - You can send a boost into the show directly in the Podcast Index. First, top-up with Alby, and then head over to the R-Weekly Highlights podcast entry on the index.
• A new way to think about value: https://value4value.info
• Get in touch with us on social media
  • Eric Nantz: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @rpodcast.bsky.social (BlueSky) and @theRcast (X/Twitter)
  • Mike Thomas: @[email protected] (Mastodon), @mike-thomas.bsky.social (BlueSky), and @mike_ketchbrook (X/Twitter) 

Music credits powered by OCRemix

• A Simple Coin Flip Can Change Fate - Final Fantasy VI - Level 99 - https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR02692
• No Time - Chrono Trigger - Jaxx - https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR00386
• Sly Thai Guy - Street Fighter II: The World Warrior - Tim Sheehy - https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR01750