Posts by Tags

GitHub

Add release tags in git

1 minute read

Published:

Scenario: You have a repository in which you’ve been using for a while. You use it for your scientific work and have published papers based on it. However, you never created releases of the repo corresponding to each publication and now you have no way of reproducing the work used in your publications. What can you do?

Using main, dev, feature branches

1 minute read

Published:

When using any type of versioning software, either collaboratively or not, there are a few best practices that should be followed regarding branching strategies. This will be a short and sweet entry. No fluff!

Using Cron jobs

2 minute read

Published:

Simply put, cron jobs are jobs/tasks (pieces of executable code, on Linux or Mac) that are run on a predefined schedule. For example,

Use Github Actions to …

2 minute read

Published:

If you are an R package developer, and you host your code on GitHub, there a few tasks that you will need to do repeatedly to ensure user experience is pleasant and that your code is stable.

Use markdown on GitHub

less than 1 minute read

Published:

Markdown for GitHub is the language of choice when creating issues, pull requests, using discussions, or editing your README file on GitHub.

R

Using main, dev, feature branches

1 minute read

Published:

When using any type of versioning software, either collaboratively or not, there are a few best practices that should be followed regarding branching strategies. This will be a short and sweet entry. No fluff!

Using Cron jobs

2 minute read

Published:

Simply put, cron jobs are jobs/tasks (pieces of executable code, on Linux or Mac) that are run on a predefined schedule. For example,

Live testing regular expressions …

2 minute read

Published:

As some point in your career you’ll find yourself needing to parse large amounts of alpha numeric data and selecting sections which match certain string patterns. For example, maybe you are parsing the contents of a webpage looking for hyperlinks, or summarizing the contents of a log file, or searching for values of parameters in a file heavy with text.

Use Github Actions to …

2 minute read

Published:

If you are an R package developer, and you host your code on GitHub, there a few tasks that you will need to do repeatedly to ensure user experience is pleasant and that your code is stable.

Stop using the library() function

1 minute read

Published:

Yes, i know, you love using the library() function in R! But it can be a real problem for several reasons:

Include DESCRIPTION file in all R projects

1 minute read

Published:

The DESCRIPTION file is a necessary staple for all R packages. Among other things (which we won’t get into, since this isn’t a post about creating R packages) it is the location for you to list all dependencies of your package. So when your package is installed the user also gets all the dependent packages installed too! Nice and tidy!

Use reproducible examples (in R) when asking for help

3 minute read

Published:

Regardless of the language you are coding in, at some point, there will come a time when you just need to ask for help. When you do, you should always include a reproducible example to help explain your problem. Failing to do so will just irritate readers and limit the number of helpful responses.

Regex

Live testing regular expressions …

2 minute read

Published:

As some point in your career you’ll find yourself needing to parse large amounts of alpha numeric data and selecting sections which match certain string patterns. For example, maybe you are parsing the contents of a webpage looking for hyperlinks, or summarizing the contents of a log file, or searching for values of parameters in a file heavy with text.

containers

Use DockerHub to store and retrieve your containers

1 minute read

Published:

So you have just built your first docker image (or podman image, but more about that in a minute). And it runs! And you are excited! So you start to tell people how cool you are, that you can run “stuff” inside a container. But then are quickly brought back down to earth when you realize that you don’t know how move this image to other platforms, like the cloud. It resides “somewhere” on your local machine, in a location that isn’t obvious.

Run your model in a container

5 minute read

Published:

Containers aren’t new, but to the scientific community (as of writing), they kinda are! So what are containers? Well, simply put, they are a running instance of an image! Oh Right … totally get it!

docker

Use DockerHub to store and retrieve your containers

1 minute read

Published:

So you have just built your first docker image (or podman image, but more about that in a minute). And it runs! And you are excited! So you start to tell people how cool you are, that you can run “stuff” inside a container. But then are quickly brought back down to earth when you realize that you don’t know how move this image to other platforms, like the cloud. It resides “somewhere” on your local machine, in a location that isn’t obvious.

Run your model in a container

5 minute read

Published:

Containers aren’t new, but to the scientific community (as of writing), they kinda are! So what are containers? Well, simply put, they are a running instance of an image! Oh Right … totally get it!

git

Add release tags in git

1 minute read

Published:

Scenario: You have a repository in which you’ve been using for a while. You use it for your scientific work and have published papers based on it. However, you never created releases of the repo corresponding to each publication and now you have no way of reproducing the work used in your publications. What can you do?

Delete your last commit from GitHub

less than 1 minute read

Published:

We’ve all done it, you’ll be happily commiting and pushing to GitHub from either the command line or, more than likely, your favorite IDE when you panic and realize that you just mistakenly pushed something to GitHub. You start sweating, and frenetically start googling how to reverse this. Well it turns out it is pretty simple.

markdown

Use markdown on GitHub

less than 1 minute read

Published:

Markdown for GitHub is the language of choice when creating issues, pull requests, using discussions, or editing your README file on GitHub.

podman

Use DockerHub to store and retrieve your containers

1 minute read

Published:

So you have just built your first docker image (or podman image, but more about that in a minute). And it runs! And you are excited! So you start to tell people how cool you are, that you can run “stuff” inside a container. But then are quickly brought back down to earth when you realize that you don’t know how move this image to other platforms, like the cloud. It resides “somewhere” on your local machine, in a location that isn’t obvious.

Run your model in a container

5 minute read

Published:

Containers aren’t new, but to the scientific community (as of writing), they kinda are! So what are containers? Well, simply put, they are a running instance of an image! Oh Right … totally get it!

workflows

Using main, dev, feature branches

1 minute read

Published:

When using any type of versioning software, either collaboratively or not, there are a few best practices that should be followed regarding branching strategies. This will be a short and sweet entry. No fluff!

Using Cron jobs

2 minute read

Published:

Simply put, cron jobs are jobs/tasks (pieces of executable code, on Linux or Mac) that are run on a predefined schedule. For example,

Use Github Actions to …

2 minute read

Published:

If you are an R package developer, and you host your code on GitHub, there a few tasks that you will need to do repeatedly to ensure user experience is pleasant and that your code is stable.