R: Utility Functions for Methods and S-Plus Compatibility

methodUtilities {methods} | R Documentation

## Utility Functions for Methods and S-Plus Compatibility

### Description

These are utilities, currently in the methods package, that either provide some functionality needed by the package (e.g., element matching by name), or add compatibility with S-Plus, or both.

### Usage

    functionBody(fun=sys.function(sys.parent()))

    allNames(x)

    getFunction(name, generic=TRUE, mustFind=TRUE, where)

    el(object, where)

    elNamed(x, name, mustFind=FALSE)

    formalArgs(def)

    Quote()

    showDefault(object, oldMethods = TRUE)

    initMethodDispatch(where = topenv(parent.frame()))

    methodSignatureMatrix(object, sigSlots = c("target", "defined"))

### Summary of Functions

`allNames`:
  the character vector of names (unlike `names()`, never returns `NULL`).
`getFunction`:
  find the object as a function.
`elNamed`:
  get the element of the vector corresponding to name. Unlike the `[`, `[[`, and `$` operators, this function requires `name` to match the element name exactly (no partial matching).
`formalArgs`:
  Returns the names of the formal arguments of this function.
`existsFunction`:
  Is there a function of this name? If `generic` is `FALSE`, generic functions are not counted.
`findFunction`:
  return all the indices of the search list on which a function definition for `name` exists.

  If `generic` is `FALSE`, ignore generic functions.

`showDefault`:
  Utility, used to enable `show` methods to be called by the automatic printing (via `print.default`).

  Argument `oldMethods` controls whether old-style print methods are used for this object. It is `TRUE` by default if called directly, but `FALSE` when called from the methods package for automatic printing (to avoid potential recursion).

`initMethodDispatch`:
  Turn on the internal method dispatch code. Called on attaching the package. Also, if dispatch has been turned off (by calling `.isMethodsDispatchOn(FALSE)`—a very gutsy thing to do), calling this function should turn dispatch back on again.
`methodSignatureMatrix`:
  Returns a matrix with the contents of the specified slots as rows. The slots should be named character strings of the same length. Basically used to turn the signatures of a `"MethodDefinition"` objectg into a matrix for printing.

[Package methods version 2.6.2 Index]