Programming in R

In this unit, you will learn how to create functions and learn some programming tricks.

Follow the links to each lecture, lab, and reading.

Scroll down to download the SWIRL lessons.

Lesson 1. How to write less code

Lecture: Writing your own functions

Learning Goals:

• Understand principles of programming,
• Understand the elements of a function,
• Style guide for function code,
• Write simple functions,
• Nest functions within other functions.

SWIRL: Writing functions

Lab: Unit 6: Lab 1

Reading: Best practice for writing R code

Functions: function()

Lesson 2. How to automate your work

Lecture: Control Structures slides

Learning Goals:

• Use loops and ifelse statements,
• Identify situations where loops are useful

SWIRL: Loops

Lab: Unit 6: Lab 2

Reading: Crawley, M. The R Book Ch 2. Essentials of the R Language. 2.10 Loops and repeats

Functions: if(), else(), for() {}, while() {}, repeat {}, break, next

Lesson 3: How to sample and generate random values

Lecture: Sampling.

Learning Goals:

• Generate and use random numbers,
• sample with and without replacement,

SWIRL: Sampling and simulation

Lab: Unit 6: Lab 3

Reading: Crawley, M. The R Book Ch 2. Essentials of the R Language. 2.9 Random numbers, shuffling, and sampling

Functions: sample(), rbinom(), rnorm(),