1 ANNOUNCING ESS **************** The ESS Developers proudly announce the release of ESS 5.2.2 Emacs Speaks Statistics (ESS) provides an intelligent, consistent interface between the user and the software. ESS interfaces with S-PLUS, R, SAS, BUGS and other statistical analysis packages under the Unix, Microsoft Windows, and Apple Mac OS operating systems. ESS is a package for the GNU Emacs and XEmacs text editors whose features ESS uses to streamline the creation and use of statistical software. ESS knows the syntax and grammar of statistical analysis packages and provides consistent display and editing features based on that knowledge. ESS assists in interactive and batch execution of statements written in these statistical analysis languages. ESS is freely available under the GNU General Public License (GPL). Please read the file COPYING which comes with the distribution, for more information about the license. For more detailed information, please read the README files that come with ESS. 1.1 Getting the Latest Version ============================== The latest version of ESS is always available on the web at: ESS web page (http://www.analytics.washington.edu/downloads/ess/) or StatLib (http://lib.stat.cmu.edu/general/ESS/) There no longer is an anonymous CVS repository for ESS, due to lack of interest, little demand, and problems with security. 1.2 Current Features ==================== * Languages Supported: * S family (S 3/4, S-PLUS 3.x/4.x/5.x/6.x, and R) * SAS * BUGS * Stata * XLispStat including Arc and ViSta * Editing source code (S family, SAS, BUGS, XLispStat) * Syntactic indentation and highlighting of source code * Partial evaluation of code * Loading and error-checking of code * Source code revision maintenance * Batch execution (SAS, BUGS) * Use of imenu to provide links to appropriate functions * Interacting with the process (S family, SAS, XLispStat) * Command-line editing * Searchable Command history * Command-line completion of S family object names and file names * Quick access to object lists and search lists * Transcript recording * Interface to the help system * Transcript manipulation (S family, XLispStat) * Recording and saving transcript files * Manipulating and editing saved transcripts * Re-evaluating commands from transcript files * Help File Editing (R) * Syntactic indentation and highlighting of source code. * Sending Examples to running ESS process. * Previewing 1.3 Requirements ================ ESS has been tested with * S-PLUS 3.3, 3.4, 4.5, 2000, 5.0, 5.1, 6.0, 6.1, 6.2 * R >=0.49 * S4 * SAS >=6.12 * BUGS 0.5, 0.603 * Stata >=6.0 * XLispStat >=3.50 on the following platforms * Linux (all) * Solaris/SunOS (all) * Microsoft Windows 95/98/NT/2000/XP (SPLUS 4.5/2000/6.*, R, SAS and BUGS) * Apple Mac OS (SAS for OS 9 and X11 R for OS X) with the following versions of emacs * GNU Emacs 20.3, 20.4, 20.5, 20.6, 20.7, 21.1, 21.3 * XEmacs 21.0, 21.1.13-14, 21.4.0-8, 21.4.9-13/21.5.17(1), 21.4.14-15; as of June 2004, ESS does not work with XEmacs Betas such as 21.5.17 * GNU Emacs <20.3 and XEmacs <21.0(2) ---------- Footnotes ---------- (1) requires the files.el patch to revert-buffer for the Local Variables updating problem (2) These releases of emacs are no longer supported, so an upgrade is recommended if you plan to use ESS. If you have GNU Emacs 19.29, see *Note Unix installation::. Also, note that the `custom' library bundled with Emacs 19.34 is too _old_, its API is incompatible with the `new custom' bundled with recent Emacsen. The `new custom' for Emacs 19.34 is available for download here (ftp://ftp.dina.kvl.dk/pub/Staff/Per.Abrahamsen/custom/custom-1.9962.tar.gz). 1.4 Stability ============= Versions 5.1.x are meant to be gamma-level releases. While some bugs are fixed, others may have been introduced, especially with regards to new features. See the file doc/TODO for details. Bug reports are solicited; see the Bugs Section below. Patches or suggested coding fixes with bug reports are much appreciated! 1.5 Mailing List ================ There is a mailing list for discussions and announcements relating to ESS. Join the list by sending an e-mail with "subscribe ess-help" (or "help") in the body to ; contributions to the list may be mailed to . Rest assured, this is a fairly low-volume mailing list. The purposes of the mailing list include * helping users of ESS to get along with it. * discussing aspects of using ESS on Emacs and XEmacs. * suggestions for improvements. * announcements of new releases of ESS. * posting small patches to ESS. 1.6 Reporting Bugs ================== Please send bug reports, suggestions etc. to The easiest way to do this is within Emacs by typing `M-x ess-submit-bug-report' This also gives the maintainers valuable information about your installation which may help us to identify or even fix the bug. If Emacs reports an error, backtraces can help us debug the problem. Type "M-x set-variable RET debug-on-error RET t RET". Then run the command that causes the error and you should see a *Backtrace* buffer containing debug information; send us that buffer. Note that comments, suggestions, words of praise and large cash donations are also more than welcome. 1.7 Authors =========== * A.J. Rossini (mailto:rossini@u.washington.edu) * Richard M. Heiberger (mailto:rmh@temple.edu) * Kurt Hornik (mailto:hornik@ci.tuwien.ac.at) * Martin Maechler (mailto:maechler@stat.math.ethz.ch) * Rodney A. Sparapani (mailto:rsparapa@mcw.edu) * Stephen Eglen (mailto:stephen@gnu.org) 1.8 License =========== ESS is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2, or (at your option) any later version. ESS is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License in the file COPYING in the same directory as this file for more details. 1.9 New Features ================ Changes/New Features in 5.2.2: * bug-fixes for 5.2.1 (require 'executable), html docs, etc. * ess-lisp-directory/../doc/info added to Info-directory-list if ess-info not found by info * ESS[R]: If you have other versions of R on your exec-path, such as "R-1.8.1" with Unix or "rw1081" with Windows, ESS will find them and create appropriate functions, such as M-x R-1.8.1 or M-x rw1081, for calling them. By default only Unix programs beginning "R-1" and "R-2" and Windows programs parallel to the version of R in your exec-path will be found, but see ess-r-versions and ess-rterm-versions for ways to find other versions of R. * ESS[R]: Other versions of R, such as "R-1.8.1" on Unix and "rw1081" on Windows, are added to the "ESS / Start Process / Other" menu. * ESS[S]: If you have other versions of S-Plus on your Windows computer, such as S-Plus 6.1 or S-Plus 4.5, ESS will find them and create appropriate functions, such as M-x splus61, for calling the console version (Sqpe) inside an emacs buffer. By default only programs installed in the default location will be found, but see ess-SHOME-versions for ways to find other versions of S-Plus. * ESS[S]: Other versions of Sqpe on Windows, such as "splus61", are added to the "ESS / Start Process / Other" menu. * ESS[R]: (bug fix) ess-quit (bound to C-c C-q) should now quit the inferior R process, when issued from either the inferior buffer, or from a .R buffer. Changes/New Features in 5.2.1: * ESS[S] (R and S-plus): now have toolbar support with icons to evaluate code in the inferior process or to switch there. This code is experimental and likely to change as XEmacs/Emacs issues get resolved. The toolbar should be enabled if your Emacs displays images, but can be disabled with the variable ess-use-toolbar. Thanks to David Smith from Insightful for the S-plus logo. * ESS[SAS]: ess-sas-graph-view (F12) enhanced; you can specify external file viewers for each graphics file type via the alist ess-sas-graph-view-viewer-alist; also .jpg/.gif are now handled by image-mode on XEmacs, if available, otherwise by graphics primitives as before Changes/New Features in 5.2.0: * ESS[BUGS]: new info documentation! now supports interactive processing thanks to Aki Vehtari (mailto:Aki.Vehtari@hut.fi); new architecture-independent unix support as well as support for BUGS v. 0.5 * ESS[SAS]: convert .log to .sas with ess-sas-transcript; info documentation improved; Local Variable bug fixes; SAS/IML statements/functions now highlighted; files edited remotely by ange-ftp/EFS/tramp are recognized and pressing SUBMIT opens a buffer on the remote host via the local variable ess-sas-shell-buffer-remote-init which defaults to "ssh"; changed the definition of the variable ess-sas-edit-keys-toggle to boolean rather than 0/1; added the function ess-electric-run-semicolon which automatically reverse indents lines containing only "run;"; C-F1 creates MS RTF portrait from the current buffer; C-F2 creates MS RTF landscape from the current buffer; C-F9 opens a SAS DATASET with PROC INSIGHT rather than PROC FSVIEW; C-F10 kills all buffers associated with .sas program; "inferior" aliases for SAS batch: C-c C-r for submit region, C-c C-b for submit buffer, C-c C-x for goto .log; C-c C-y for goto .lst * ESS[S]: Pressing underscore ("_") once inserts " <- " (as before); pressing underscore twice inserts a literal underscore. To stop this smart behaviour, add "(ess-smart-underscore nil)" to your .emacs after ess-site has been loaded; ess-dump-filename-template-proto (new name!) now can be customized successfully (for S language dialects); Support for Imenu has been improved; set ess-imenu-use-S to non-nil to get an "Imenu-S" item on your menubar; ess-help: Now using nice underlines (instead of `nuke-* ^H_') * ESS[R]: After (require 'essa-r), M-x ess-r-var allows to load numbers from any Emacs buffer into an existing *R* process; M-x ess-rdired gives a "directory editor" of R objects; fixed ess-retr-lastvalue-command, i.e. .Last.value bug (thanks to David Brahm) * ESS: Support for creating new window frames has been added to ESS. Inferior ESS processes can be created in dedicated frames by setting inferior-ess-own-frame to t. ESS help buffers can also open in new frames; see the documentation for ess-help-own-frame for details. (Thanks to Kevin Rodgers for contributing code.) Changes/New Features in 5.1.24: * The version number is now correct even inside ESS/Emacs Changes/New Features in 5.1.23: * Minor more Makefile clean up. Changes/New Features in 5.1.22: * Besides info documentation, PDF and HTML documentation are also provided (instead of built using "make") and available on the web as well; see ESS web page (http://software.biostat.washington.edu/ess/doc) and StatLib (http://lib.stat.cmu.edu/general/ESS/doc) * Now that info documentation is available, the README.* files are no longer supported. However, they are still distributed for what it's worth. * ESS is now an XEmacs package! See XEmacs Installation HOWTO (http://www.xemacs.org/Install/index.html) for details (specifically, items 10-15). * ESS[SAS]: more user-friendly enhancements for remote SAS batch jobs with Kermit file transfers (LOG and OUTPUT function key features now supported). Multiple shells now supported so you can run SAS on different computers from different buffers by setting the buffer-local variable ess-sas-shell-buffer to unique buffer names. * Major re-vamping of Makefile/Makeconf. Changes/New Features in 5.1.21: * ESS[SAS]: info documentation now available!, see ESS->Help for SAS; F12 opens GSASFILE nearest point for viewing either within emacs, when available, or via an external viewer; more syntax highlighting keywords; more enhancements for remote SAS batch jobs with Kermit; new framework for remote SAS interactive jobs, see ess-remote * ESS[S]: info documentation now available!, see ESS->Help for the S family * Makefile: tag now independent of rel; info files made by doc/Makefile and installed in new info sub-directory Changes/New Features in 5.1.20: * New `options()$STERM' in the S dialects (S, S-Plus, R). The S program can determine the environment in which it is currently running. ESS sets the option to `iESS' or `ddeESS' when it starts an S language process. We recommend other specific values for S language processes that ESS does not start. * New `ess-mouse-me' function, assigned to S-mouse-3 by default. User may click on a word or region and then choose from the menu to display the item, or a summary, or a plot, etc. This feature is still under development. * GNU Emacs 21.1 is now supported (fixed for S dialects, SAS & BUGS), (some from Stephen Eglen). * XEmacs 21.x is now supported (fixed w32-using-nt bug) * XEmacs on Win (NT) is better supported. * Workaround for bug in Sqpe+6 (S-PLUS 6 for Win). * should now work even when imenu is not available (for old Xemacsen). * ESS[SAS]: XEmacs-Imenu fix; C-TAB is globalized along with your function-key definitions, if specified; you can specify your SAS library definitions outside of autoexec.sas for ess-sas-data-view with SAS code placed in the variable ess-sas-data-view-libname, also the dataset name is defaulted to the nearest permanent dataset to point; Speedbar support now works for permanent datasets, please ignore first./last.; new font-locking is now the default with more improvements for font-locking PROCs, macro statements, * ; and %* ; comments; you can toggle sas-log-mode with F10 which will font-lock your .log (if it isn't too big); submit remote .sas files accessed with ange-ftp, EFS or Tramp (Kermit is experimental) by setting ess-sas-submit-method to 'sh; ess-sas-submit-command and ess-sas-submit-command-options are buffer-local so you can have local file variable sections at the end of your .sas files to request different executables or specify special options and the local file variables are re-read at submit instead of only at file open so that if you make a change it is picked up immediately; * ESS[BUGS]: font-lock with `in' fixed. * for STATA: font-lock bug fixed. * for Rd mode: C-c C-v and `switch-process' in menu. further, C-c C-f prefix (Rd-font) for inserting or surrounding a word by things such as \code{.}, \code{\link{.}}, \emph{.} etc. * new functions (ess-directory-function) and (ess-narrow-to-defun) ess-directory <-> default-directory logic (Jeff Mincy). * Re-organized Makefile and fixed a few bugs. Changes/New Features in 5.1.19: * S+6 now supported (Tony Rossini (Unix) and Rich Heiberger (Windows)) * New BUGS support through ESS[BUGS] mode (Rodney Sparapani) Templates assist you in writing .bug and .cmd code (.cmd and .log are replaced by .bmd and .bog to avoid emacs extension collisions). Substitution" parameters facilitate "automagic" generation of data...in" and "init...in" filenames, "const N=" from your data file and "monitor()/stats()" commands. Activated by pressing F12. * Fixes for `ess-smart-underscore' SAS breakage (Rich Heiberger) * You can change between PC and Unix, local and global SAS function-key definitions interactively (Rich Heiberger) * C-Submit a highlighted region to SAS batch (Rodney Sparapani) * New and improved SAS syntax highlighting (Rodney Sparapani) To get the new functionality, set ess-sas-run-make-regexp to nil. Also available in .log files via F10. * Open a permanent SAS dataset for viewing via F9 (Rodney Sparapani) You must have the library defined in autoexec.sas for it to work. * User-friendly defaults for `sas-program', `ess-sas-batch-pre-command' and `ess-sas-batch-post-command' as well Customize support for these and other ESS[SAS] variables (Rodney Sparapani) * `ess-sas-suffix-2' now defaults to .dat via F11 (Rodney Sparapani) * Emacs/XEmacs, Unix/Windows issues collectively handled in ess-emcs.el * defadvice solves problem of missing *ESS* (thanks to Jeff Mincy) * Improved manual a bit by including things that were only in `README'. Changes/New Features in 5.1.18: * New `ess-smart-underscore' function, now assigned to "_" by default. Inserts `ess-S-assign' (customizable " <- "), unless inside string and comments where plain "_" is used instead. (MM) * Fixes for longstanding interactive SAS breakage (RMH) Changes/New Features in 5.1.17: * Documentation for Windows Installation (Rich Heiberger) * removal of ess-vars, finalization of customize support (in the sense that there is no more use of ess-vars, but that we need to fix ess-cust) (AJ Rossini) * Many small (and large) fixes/contributions (MMaechler) * addition of the "S-equal" variable and provide M-x ess-add-MM-keys a way to remap "_" to `ess-S-assign', typically " <- ", but customizable. (MMaechler) Changes/New Features in 5.1.16: * BUG FIXES * Better SAS support Changes/New Features in 5.1.15: * BUG FIXES Changes/New Features in 5.1.14: * Yet more fixes to SAS mode, (Rich Heiberger and Rodney Sparapani) * Customize support (for most Emacsen which support it) (AJRossini) * ARC and ViSta support out of the box, and fixes for XLispStat (AJRossini) Changes/New Features in 5.1.13: * Version numbering finally all depending on the ./VERSION file, thanks to Martin Maechler. * Yet more fixes to SAS mode, thanks to Rich Heiberger. Changes/New Features in 5.1.12: * Splus 5.1 stabilized, thanks to Martin Maechler, Bill Venables, Chuck Taylor, and others. * More fixes to SAS mode, thanks to Rodney Sparapani and Rich Heiberger. Changes/New Features in 5.1.11: * More fixes to Stata mode, thanks to Brendan Halpin (mailto:brendan@essex.ac.uk). * fixed bugs in ESS-elsewhere, thanks to many testers * README.SPLUS4WIN has DETAILED instructions for S-PLUS 2000, thanks to David Brahm (mailto:brahm@alum.mit.edu). * Fixes to SAS mode, thanks to Rodney Sparapani Changes/New Features in 5.1.10: * More fixes to Stata mode * primitive generic version of ESS-elsewhere * Small fixes to SAS/Stata. Changes/New Features in 5.1.9: * Stata mode works * Literate Data Analysis using Noweb works Changes/New Features in 5.1.8: * Bug fixes * R documentation mode defaults changed Changes/New Features in 5.1.2: * able to use inferior iESS mode to communicate directly with a running S-Plus 4.x process using the Microsoft DDE protocol. We use the familiar (from Unix ESS) C-c C-n and related key sequences to send lines from the S-mode file to the inferior S process. We continue to edit S input files in ESS[S] mode and transcripts of previous S sessions in ESS Transcript mode. All three modes know the S language, syntax, and indentation patterns and provide the syntactic highlighting that eases the programming tasks.