Packrat is a dependency management system for R.
Use packrat to make your R projects more:
- Isolated: Installing a new or updated package for one project won't break your other projects, and vice versa. That's because packrat gives each project its own private package library.
- Portable: Easily transport your projects from one computer to another, even across different platforms. Packrat makes it easy to install the packages your project depends on.
- Reproducible: Packrat records the exact package versions you depend on, and ensures those exact versions are the ones that get installed wherever you go.
See the project page for more information, or join the discussion at packrat-discuss.
Start by installing Packrat:
if (!require("devtools")) install.packages("devtools")
devtools::install_github("rstudio/packrat")
Then, start a new R session at the base directory of your project and type:
packrat::init()
This will install Packrat, set up a private library to be used for this
project, and then place you in packrat mode. While in packrat mode, calls to
functions like install.packages and remove.packages will modify the
private project library, rather than the user library.
When you want to manage the state of your private library, you can use the Packrat functions:
packrat::snapshot(): Save the current state of your library.packrat::restore(): Restore the library state saved in the most recent snapshot.packrat::clean(): Remove unused packages from your library.
Share a Packrat project with bundle and unbundle:
packrat::bundle(): Bundle a packrat project, for easy sharing.packrat::unbundle(): Unbundle a packrat project, generating a project directory with libraries restored.
Navigate projects and set/get options with:
packrat::packrat_mode(): Toggle packrat mode on and off, for navigating between projects within a single R session.packrat::get_opts,packrat::set_opts: Get/set project-specific settings.
There are also utility functions for using and managing packages in the
external / user library, and can be useful for leveraging packages in the user
library that you might not want as project-specific dependencies, e.g.
devtools, knitr, roxygen2:
packrat::extlib(): Load an external package.packrat::with_extlib(): With an external package, evaluate an expression. The external package is loaded only for the duration of the evaluated expression.