Initialization

• R
  • The file $HOME/.Renviron can be used to set environment variables within R. The current value of environment variables can be seen using >options(). For example, my .Renviron file contains:
    R_PAPERSIZE=letter 
    R_LIBS=~/R/library # use so it knows to look in this directory for libraries 
    WIDTH=150
  • The file $HOME/.Rprofile is sourced when R starts. This is a handy place to call libraries that you use often and define functions. For example, my .Rprofile file contains:
    library(ts)    # for acf 
    library(mgcv)  # for GAMs 
    source("~paciorek/R/utils.q")
  • You can also create .First files in .Rprofile that are called on startup. Or .First files can live in .RData.
  • Finally, note that you can have local .Renviron and .Rprofile files that are called only when starting R in the particular directory.
• Splus
  Initialization code for Splus in Linux is in $HOME/MySwork/.S.init. Any S code in this file is run at the beginning of your S session, regardless of which .Data directory you are using.