help {base} | R Documentation |
These functions provide access to documentation.
Documentation on a topic with name name
(typically, an R
object or a data set) can be printed with either help(name)
or
?name
.
help(topic, offline = FALSE, package = .packages() lib.loc = .lib.loc, verbose = getOption("verbose"), chmhelp = getOption("chmhelp"), htmlhelp = getOption("htmlhelp"), winhelp = getOption("winhelp")) ?topic
topic |
a name or character string on which documentation is sought (but not a variable containing a character string!). |
offline |
a logical indicating whether documentation should be displayed on-line to the screen (the default) or hardcopy of it should be produced. |
package |
a name or character vector giving the packages to look into for documentation. By default, all packages in the search path are used. |
lib.loc |
A character vector of directory names of R libraries. Defaults to all libraries currently known. |
verbose |
logical; if TRUE , the file name is reported. |
chmhelp |
logical (or NULL ). If TRUE the
Compiled HTML version of the help will be shown in a help viewer. |
htmlhelp |
logical (or NULL ). If TRUE , the HTML
version of the help will be shown in a browser. |
winhelp |
logical (or NULL ). If TRUE , a Windows
.hlp file will be used if one is available. |
In the case of unary and binary operators and control-flow special forms, the name may need to be quoted.
If offline
is TRUE
, hardcopy of the documentation is
produced by running the LaTeX version of the help page through
latex
(note that LaTeX 2e is needed). You need to customize
the file `R_HOME/bin/helpPRINT.bat' which contains an example.
The appearance of the output can be customized through a file
`Rhelp.cfg' somewhere in your LaTeX search path.
You will only get help for R objects in your
search()
path, i.e., help(dist)
will only work after
library(mva)
. To look in all the packages in all the
current libraries, use
help(topic, package=.packages(all=T), lib.loc=.lib.loc)
The help files can be many small files. On some file systems it is desirable to save space, and the text files in the `help' directory of an installed package can be zipped up as a zip archive `Rhelp.zip'. Ensure the files `AnIndex' and `00Titles' remain un-zipped. Similarly, all the files in the `latex' directory can be zipped to `Rhelp.zip'.
help.search()
for finding help pages on a ``vague'' topic.
help.start()
which opens the HTML version of the R
Manual;
library()
for listing available packages and the
user-level objects they contain;
data()
for listing available data sets;
methods()
.
See prompt()
to get a prototype for writing help
pages of private packages.
help() help(help) # the same help(lapply) ?lapply # the same help("for") # or ?"for", but the quotes are needed ?"+" help(package = stepfun) # get help even when it's not present data() # list all available data sets ?women # information about data set "women" topi <- "women" help(topi) ##--> Error: No documentation for `topi'