R/dsims-package.R

In dsims: Distance Sampling Simulations

#' Distance Sampling Simulations 'dsims'
#'
#' Runs simulations of distance sampling surveys to help users optimise
#' their survey designs for their particular study.
#'
#' The full process involves defining the study region, a description of the
#' population of interest (including its distribution within the study region),
#' a survey design, a detection process and one or more models to fit to the
#' resulting data. The simulation engine will then use this information to
#' generate both a population and a set of transects and simulate the detection
#' process. The resulting data will be analysed and the estimates stored.
#' By repeating this many times we can test the accuracy and precision of
#' our estimates from various survey designs given our particular population
#' of interest.
#'
#' This package interfaces with the survey design package 'dssd' to create the survey
#' regions, designs and generate the survey transects. While the 'DSsim' simulation
#' package relied on survey transects already being contained in shapefiles within
#' the supplied directory, dsims will generate the survey transects directly in R.
#'
#'  The main functions in this package are: \link{make.density}, \link{make.population.description}, \link{make.detectability}, \link{make.ds.analysis}, \link{make.simulation}, \link{run.survey} and \link{run.simulation}. See also \link{make.region} and \link{make.design} in the dssd package for examples of how to define study regions and designs.
#'
#' Further information on distance sampling methods and example code is available at \url{http://distancesampling.org/R/}.
#'
#' We are also in the process of setting up a new area of the website for vignettes / example code at \url{http://examples.distancesampling.org }. While this is being developed, the 'dsims' vignette can still be found within this package.
#'
#' For help with distance sampling and this package, there is a Google Group \url{https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/distance-sampling}.
#'
#' @name dsims-package
#' @aliases dsims-package dsims
#' @docType package
#' @author Laura Marshall <lhm@@st-and.ac.uk>
#' @keywords package
#'
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