Workspaces offer users a simple way to generate output reports and documents as Latex or PDF formats.
A report script consists of LaTeX with optional embedded R code. To create a report script:
- Navigate to the workspace where you want to create the script.
- Click the 'Add' dropdown menu icon then select the 'New File' command, enter a filename and select 'R NoWeb file' (*.rnw) as the format.
- You are taken to the editor page – enter the script content and save the file.
- The new script is saved as a file in your workspace.
Editing a report script
When you navigate to the Files tab, you can see and filter all of the report scripts in the current workspace. To edit an existing report script:
- Click the name of the report script you want to edit.
- The content of the script is loaded into the text editor.
- Make the required changes to the script.
- Click the 'Save' button to save the changes to the script.
Alternatively you can save the altered script as a new version of the file; to do this, click the 'Save as' button.
Loading the 'knitr' library
To generate reports you must load the 'knitr' package. To do this:
- Open an R console, if one is not already open.
- Enter the command: 'library(knitr)'
- Press 'Return'
You can include this command in your 'local.r' file, but note that changes to local.r apply only to subsequent sessions and do not affect an existing R console session.
Generating a report from a script
To generate a report from a script:
- Navigate to the workspace containing the report script and go to the R Session tab.
- Click 'Start console'.
- In the right hand sidebar, under 'Files', hover over the report script you want to run.
- Click the 'Run in console' button for the script.
- Press the 'Return' key to process the script.
If the script runs successfully a new PDF report will be generated, with the name of the report (for example, Rreport000.pdf') appearing in the Reports tab in the right-hand pane. NOTE: the xap.knit function will fail if the 'knitr' R package has not been loaded. See Loading the 'knitr' Library section above for details on how to load this package.
Viewing a generated report and optionally saving it to the workspace
After generating the report, its temporary name will appear in the Reports tab in the right-hand pane. Click on the name to:
- view the report
- rename the report
- add a description of the report
- save the report as a file
Making an image file available to a report script
If you have an image file in your workspace, you can make it available when generating a report, for use in LaTeX, by using the function 'xap.image'. You can do this in the R session at any time prior to generating the report, or within the .rnw file itself. This will automatically include the required image in the generated PDF report.