forked from IQSS/Zelig4
-
Notifications
You must be signed in to change notification settings - Fork 0
/
Copy pathANNOUNCEMENT.txt
58 lines (35 loc) · 3.6 KB
/
ANNOUNCEMENT.txt
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
The Zelig core team is pleased to announce the alpha release of Zelig 4.
Designated as the "Developer Update", Zelig 4 offers a wide-range of improvements to ease the process of adding new statistical models to the already extensive Zelig software suite. Significantly, this release is packaged with a brand-new API, geared towards reducing the complexity and length of Zelig's development functions - the zelig2, param and qi methods. In addition to this, Zelig now brandishes a package-creator (zelig.skeleton) that operates in the same vein as R's core function "package.skeleton".
In addition to changes in the development toolkit, Zelig has now been split across 13 distinct packages. This change has been made to refine the scope of Zelig and its add-ons. In particular, this restructuring of Zelig into a full software suite allows developers to contribute, develop and repair add-on packages without tinkering with the Zelig API and core functionality.
While this release's prime focus has been improving the developer toolkit and restructuring the software suite, Zelig 4 offers an end-user experience completely identical to previous versions. That is, zelig's basic functions - zelig, setx and sim - ostensibly remain unchanged in functionality for available statistical models.
For full details concerning changes between Zelig 3.5 and Zelig 4, please refer to:
http://zeligdev.github.com/
New Features
------------
Some of the new available features are:
A revised developer API. The primary developer methods - zelig2, param and sim - have been reimplemented to use a sleeker, simpler API. For information, please read the Zelig developer's manual found here:
http://zeligdev.github.com/files/booklet.pdf
The core package has been restructured and minimized. In particular, Zelig core now contains only code essential to its operation, while all non-essential tasks have been made into specific R-packages. For a complete list of official Zelig packages, please refer to:
https://github.com/zeligdev
Development tools for contributors have been added to the core package. In particular, the "zelig.skeleton" function is packaged within Zelig-core in order to facilitate the rapid development of new Zelig packages.
The Zelig software suite has grown to include a total of 7 R-packages. This change offers a simple and easy method for ensuring that development and bug-fixing within any particular Zelig add-on will leave the remainder of the Zelig software suite unchanged.
A hook API has been integrated into the core package, in order to reduce the necessity to directly alter the zelig, setx and sim methods.
Roxygen-compliant documentation has become standard in all Zelig packages. This offers an easy way to manage Rd documentation, dependencies and exports from within the R code itself. That is, documentation is more tightly paired with the actual R code. For more information about Roxygen, please refer to:
http://roxygen.org/
GitHub
------
Zelig is now on GitHub! Fork an add-on package or contribute bug-finds today!
For a full listing of official packages and their repositories, please see:
https://github.com/zeligdev
Links
-----
The following comprises a list of relevant information for Zelig 4:
* Website: http://zeligdev.github.com/
* Package Repositories: https://github.com/zeligdev/
* Installation Guide: http://zeligdev.github.com/files/zelig.pdf
* Zelig Manual: http://zeligdev.github.com/#install
* Available and Missing Add-on Packages: http://zeligdev.github.com/#models
Questions
---------
For any particular questions on developing new Zelig models, please send all mail to: