packrat-package: Packrat: Reproducible dependency management

In packrat: A Dependency Management System for Projects and their R Package Dependencies

Packrat: Reproducible dependency management

Description

Packrat is a tool for managing the R packages your project depends on in an isolated, portable, and reproducible way.

Details

Use packrat to make your R projects more:

• Isolated: Installing a new or updated package for one project won't break your other projects, and vice versa. That's because packrat gives each project its own private package library.

• Portable: Easily transport your projects from one computer to another, even across different platforms. Packrat makes it easy to install the packages your project depends on.

• Reproducible: Packrat records the exact package versions you depend on, and ensures those exact versions are the ones that get installed wherever you go.

Use init to create a new packrat project, snapshot to record changes to your project's library, and restore to recreate your library the way it was the last time you (or anyone!) took a snapshot.

Using these simple functions and sharing packrat's files lets you collaborate in a shared, consistent environment with others as your project grows and changes, and provides an easy way to share your results when you're done.

Anatomy of a packrat project

A packrat project contains a few extra files and directories. The init function creates these files for you, if they don't already exist.

packrat/lib/

Private package library for this project.

packrat/src/

Source packages of all the dependencies that packrat has been made aware of.

packrat/packrat.lock

Lists the precise package versions that were used to satisfy dependencies, including dependencies of dependencies. (This file should never be edited by hand!)

.Rprofile

Directs R to use the private package library (when it is started from the project directory).

Using packrat with version control

Packrat is designed to work hand in hand with Git, Subversion, or any other version control system. Be sure to check in the .Rprofile, packrat.lock files, and everything under packrat/src/. You can tell your VCS to ignore packrat/lib/ (or feel free to check it in if you don't mind taking up some extra space in your repository).

Author(s)

Posit Software, PBC

See Also

Useful links:

• https://github.com/rstudio/packrat

• Report bugs at https://github.com/rstudio/packrat/issues

Examples

## Not run: 
# Create a new packrat project from an existing directory of \R code
init()

# Install a package and take a snapshot of the new state of the library
install.packages("TTR")
snapshot()

# Accidentally remove a package and restore to add it back
remove.packages("TTR")
restore()

## End(Not run)

packrat documentation built on Sept. 8, 2023, 5:44 p.m.