The R Contribution Working Group

Heather Turner

July 10, 2024

2020 was a time of reflection…

11 members of R Core on a video call for useR! 2020 R Core Panel

The long view: R Core Commits 1997 - 2024

Formation of R Contribution Working Group (RCWG)

Community meeting 24 July 2020

  • >25 people: R Core, R Foundation, Forwards, R Consortium Diversity & Inclusion Group, R-Ladies, Python Core + wider R community.

How to foster a larger, more diverse community of contributors?

  • Supportive infrastructure
  • Opportunities to learn
  • Opportunities to contribute

Supportive infrastructure

Improved communications

https://contributor.r-project.org

  • Joining page for Slack
  • Event calendar
  • Video tutorials
  • Novice-friendly documentation

Social media: @R_Contributors@hachyderm.io, @_R_Contributors on X/Twitter.

Weblate interface

https://translate.rx.studio

Screenshot from Weblate

  • Web interface to contribute translations
  • Prototype by Gergely Daróczi: useR! 2022 Poster
  • Recommended packages and Mac GUI added in 2024

R Dev Container

https://github.com/r-devel/r-dev-env/

Screenshot of R Dev Container running in GitHub Codespaces.

  • GitHub Codespace with prerequisites for building R
  • VS Code IDE to work on R/C files
  • Docs to step through contributor workflow
  • Product of GSoC 2023 & 2024 projects w/ Atharva Shirdhankar.

Opportunities to learn

R Development Guide

https://contributor.r-project.org/rdevguide/

  • Installing R-devel from source
  • Reporting and reviewing bugs
  • Contributing code, documentation, translations
  • Product of R Foundation & Google Season of Docs

useR! 2024 virtual talk by Saranjeet Kaur Bhogal & Lluís Revilla

Collaboration Campfires, Feb-May 2022

Code for Science & Society Digital Infrastructure Incubator with Saranjeet Kaur Bhogal

  • Series of four 90-minute sessions introducing ways to contribute
  • Informal, exploratory, interactive
  • Targeted outreach to people from underrepresented groups
  • 10-20 people at each session

C Study Group for R Contributors

Two incarnations:

Check out Ella Kaye’s C for R Users talk at 14:15 in Salzburg II!

Tutorials

Run at useR! 2021 and again this year

Opportunities to contribute

R Contribution Office Hours

  • Started November 2022
  • Monthly, 2nd Thursday
  • Two time-zones (10am and 5:30pm UK)
  • Informal opportunity to work on any aspect of contributing to R
  • Has led to patches and bug fixes

LatinR translation hackathons

October 2022, Online

  • Led by Beatriz Milz, Ángela Sanzo, Macarena Quiroga
  • 10 participants ~500 translations

October 2023, Uruguay

  • Led María Nanton and Pao Corrales
  • Spanish translation coverage increased from 40% to 42%

Bug BBQ (useR! 2022)


  • Global, online, 24-hour event to work on open bugs.
  • ~20 participants, from new to R Core
  • 22 selected code/documentation bug reports
    • 10 fixed or almost fixed
  • Report on GitHub

This image was created by Sciberia for The Turing Way community and is used under CC-BY license.

R Project Sprint 2023

  • 3-day collaborative event
  • 11 R Core + > 40 selected participants
    • Diverse experience and demographics
  • Range of activities
    • Localization (translation, docs & Weblate admin)
    • R/C Code (bugs, refining, extending, roadmaps)
    • Documentation
  • ~2000 translations, 16 issues closed within 2 months

R Dev Days

  • 1-day versions of the R Project Sprint

  • 1st event @ Imperial, 26 April 2024 (prior to London satRday)

    • 12 people attended (open registration)
    • Worked on 6 issues: patches for 3, diagnoses/draft for remainder
    • Report on GitHub

  • Next @ PLUS, 12 July 2024 (after useR! 2024)

    • Expecting > 40 (contributors by application + 8 from R Core Team)

  • Shared repo of issues

Future Plans

  • Further R Dev Days as satellite to conferences:

    • posit::conf(2024), Seattle, USA (by invitation)
    • RSECon24, Newcastle, UK (open to conference participants)
    • Shiny in Production, Newcastle, UK (open registration TBA)

  • Ongoing office hours

  • C Study Group 2025

https://contributor.r-project.org