zpackages

R Base 3.6.2

.packages returns information about package availability.

Syntax

.packages(all.available = FALSE, lib.loc = NULL)

Arguments

Parameter	Description
`all.available`	logical; if TRUE return a character vector of all available packages in lib.loc.
`lib.loc`	a character vector describing the location of R library trees to search through, or NULL. The default value of NULL corresponds to .libPaths().

Return Value

A character vector of package base names, invisible unless all.available = TRUE.

Details

.packages() returns the names of the currently attached packages invisibly whereas .packages(all.available = TRUE) gives (visibly) all packages available in the library location path lib.loc. For a package to be regarded as being ‘available’ it must have valid metadata (and hence be an installed package). However, this will report a package as available if the metadata does not match the directory name: use find.package to confirm that the metadata match or installed.packages for a much slower but more comprehensive check of ‘available’ packages.

Examples

Example

# NOT RUN {
(.packages())               # maybe just "base"
.packages(all.available = TRUE) # return all available as character vector
require(splines)
(.packages())               # "splines", too
detach("package:splines")
# }