Software setup — R · Posit · Quarto

STAT 45203 · a working environment in a few minutes

Instructor-authored setup notes. Software is named and linked, not reproduced. Any code shown is instructor-original.

You need a way to run R. You have two good options; pick one.

Option A — Posit Cloud (browser only, nothing to install)

The fastest path, and the one used for in-class labs.

Go to posit.cloud and make a free account.
Create a new RStudio project (New Project → New RStudio Project).
In the Console, confirm R works:

# a first line of R — no packages needed
x <- c(7, 9, 12, 12, 15, 18, 24, 31)
median(x)
sample(x, replace = TRUE)   # one bootstrap-style resample

That’s it — you can run every lab this way with no installation.

Option B — Install locally (R + RStudio)

If you’d rather work offline:

Install R from r-project.org (choose your operating system).
Install RStudio Desktop (free) from posit.co/download/rstudio-desktop.
Open RStudio; it finds R automatically. Run the same check as above in the Console.

Packages we may use

Base R already includes almost everything this course needs — sample(), replicate(), median(), rank(), wilcox.test(), quantile(), lm(). A few optional packages appear occasionally:

# Install commands: run once in your own session with internet access (not part of a clean-session data analysis).
# only if a lab asks for it
install.packages("boot")     # convenience bootstrap functions
install.packages("infer")    # tidyverse-style permutation/bootstrap (ModernDive style)
install.packages("MASS")     # rlm() for a robust regression demo

You will not need any paid platform (no Cengage, WebAssign, or MyLab).

Quarto (optional, for reproducible reports)

Some homework and the project ask for a short reproducible report. Quarto lets you weave R code, output, and writing into one document (this website is built with it). RStudio and Posit Cloud include Quarto already — create a new Quarto Document from the File menu and click Render.

A calculator

A non-graphing scientific calculator is recommended for quizzes and exams (a TI-84 also works). Phones may not be used as calculators on quizzes or exams.

If something breaks

Re-read the exact error message — it usually names the problem.
In labs, confirm you know what is being resampled or ranked before debugging the code; a wrong resampling scheme is a statistics bug, not an R bug.
Bring setup problems to office hours or the Math Assistance Center (Ottenheimer Library, 1st floor). Software setup help is also posted in Blackboard when needed.