README.md

In cwolfsonseeley/discoappend: Append data to a discoveryengine definition

Before getting started

The discoappend package is intended for use with the discoveryengine package. It is recommended that you are familiar with discoveryengine, especially how to create a discoveryengine definition. More about discoveryengine - including how to get started with R - can be found in its documentation.

For ease of workflow, it is recommended you are familiar with the piping function (%>%). A simple guide to this function can be found here.

Introduction to discoappend

The discoappend package allows you to output additional data columns (beyond just IDs) to discoveryengine definititons. This can be useful in a variety of situations, including:

• sanity-check your work by previewing some basic data (like names, addresses, ratings, degrees, etc) about your definition
• quickly output a report without having to wait out the 15-minute savedlist delay in CADS
• so much more!

Installation

You can install discoappend from github with:

devtools::install_github("cwolfsonseeley/discoappend")

Once installed, call the library by entering

library(discoappend)

into your console.

Chunks and how to use them

discoappend provides you with pre-defined report chunks that can be "appended" to your disco engine definition, resulting in reports that can be analyzed in R or exported to a spreadsheet. To explore the available chunks and the output of each, use the show_chunks function. Simply enter

show_chunks()

into your console, and an interactive table will pop up, allowing you to sort and search for the chunks you need.

Chunks can be used individually, piped together, or as arguments of the append function. For example, you can look at basic biographical data of your constituency by calling the basic_bio function:

basic_bio(constituency)

Or you could add employment data to the same constituency by piping:

basic_bio(constituency) %>%
  employment

Or you can use the basic_bio and employment chunks as your arguments for the append function:

append(constituency, basic_bio, employment)

Note that these last two examples will output the same data frame; they are just two ways of getting to the same result.

Remember that you will need to use the display function to view any of your output. You can do this by naming your output and then displaying it:

report = append(constituency, basic_bio, employment)
display(report)

Or by piping:

append(constituency, basic_bio, employment) %>%
  display

The display function that we're using should be familiar to disco engine users, and it does in fact work the same way. That means that you can easily household your report with the household argument or export to a file with the file argument.

Examples

We won't be printing the output of the following, but once you've installed the package you can try out this code yourself to see how it works:

library(discoappend)

is_wealthy = has_capacity(1)
is_wealthy %>% 
  basic_bio %>% 
  display

That example outputs the basic_bio chunk, which, as the name suggests, includes basic biographical information such as names and addresses.

What makes discoappend so much fun, though, is that you can easily add on additional chunks as you need them:

is_wealthy %>%
  basic_bio %>%
  degrees %>%
  employment %>%
  giving %>%
  display

And here we household the report and export it to a file:

is_wealthy %>%
  basic_bio %>%
  degrees %>%
  employment %>%
  giving %>%
  display(household = TRUE, file = "wealthy-prospects-report")

Help make discoappend better

discoappend is a tool made by and for Prospect Development. If you see something that doesn’t work correctly, or documentation that could be made clearer, or a chunk that would be useful that isn’t implemented, or anything at all that could be improved, please submit an issue by clicking on the green “New Issue” button on the discoappend issues page.

cwolfsonseeley/discoappend documentation built on March 17, 2022, 8:36 p.m.