The library() function prints an information message when objects are masked on the search path by (or from) a newly attached package. The attach() function, however, doesn't. Is there a good reason for this? I have adapted the machinery for checking conflicts used in the library () function to attach(). If there are no objections, I will check this into R-devel.
I have seen new users get into terrible trouble with attach, e.g. 1) attaching the same database multiple times, or 2) Masking a vector in an attached data frame with a transformed version in the global environment and *then* re-running a script that transforms the transformed variable. For example, run this snippet twice and you might get a surprise. foo <- data.frame(x=1:10) attach(foo) x <- x/2 A warning would certainly help. Incidentally, (1) occurs in the example for the beavers data set. I didn't find any other problems. ______________________________________________ [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel
