Instructions for Accessing Math 141 Labs

Math 141: Lab 1

Introduction

R is a wonderful programming language that we will frequently use in our course to visualize and tidy data, create programs to assist computations, create data models, and perform statistical inference. It is free, open-source, and has a large community of users who care about statistics and data science.

To begin, note that there are 3 closely related computer processes that we will work with: R, RStudio, and Quarto. It’s worth taking a moment to distinguish between them.

  • R is a programming language, which can be accessed by typing particular commands into the console or in a script.
  • RStudio is an integrated development environment (IDE), and provides a clean user interface for writing and executing R code. This is the main tool we will use to interact with the R language.
  • Quarto is a file type we’ll use to write R code and text (similar to .docx, but for programming!). It can record R code, text, and graphical outputs. One of the easiest ways to share your results with others is to distribute your Quarto (or .qmd) file. It’s a “one-stop shop” of statistical work!

RStudio comes in two varieties: RStudio Desktop and RStudio Server. The desktop version is a program you can install on your personal computer, and uses your computer’s resources to perform calculations. On the other hand, the server version can be accessed just using a web-browser, and will perform calculations on Reed’s server; there is no need to install any additional programs. For class purposes, we will use the RStudio Server.

Accessing this Lab on RStudio Server

In order to access the lab each week, you’ll have to follow these steps. Here, we detail the process of logging in to the RStudio Server and uploading a .zip file with the lab materials.

  1. Find today’s date on the course website home page schedule. Click “DOWNLOAD LAB.” This will download a .zip file to your computer.
  2. Use your web browser to navigate to the Reed RStudio server at https://rstudio.reed.edu.
  3. Log-in using your Reed username and password (the one you use for Moodle, Gmail, etc.).
  4. Click on the “Upload” button in the lower right quadrant in the RStudio screen.

Click upload in RStudio to upload the lab files onto RStudio Server.
  1. Click on “Choose File” under “File to upload.” Find where the .zip file from step 1 downloaded onto your computer (usually the “Downloads” folder), select it, and hit “Open.”
  2. You should be back in the RStudio window. If you want, you can change the “Target Directory” to be a “New Folder” called something like Math141. You will have ~10 other lab folders, so you can plan for them to all live there together if you want. Otherwise, click “OK.”
  3. You should now see files in the bottom right quadrant of RStudio, near where you clicked “Upload.” Open the “lab01” folder to see its contents.

Find your lab01 files in the bottom right quadrant of RStudio.
  1. Open lab01_yournamehere.qmd. This is the Quarto document that you’ll complete the lab in. You can (and should) rename this file to include your actual name by checking the box next to the file, clicking “Rename”, and modifying the text to include your name, e.g. lab01_meganayers.qmd, rather than lab01_yournamehere.qmd.

Rename the lab .qmd file using your name.