easystats
The easystats meta-package is install tooling wrapped around a relicensed ecosystem.
Comparison · Analytics
animation vs haven
A side-by-side editorial comparison of animation and haven — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.
Shared themes:r
animation vs haven: at a glance
What is animation?
Contribution-driven maintenance on a package whose last structural change was magick support.
animation renders statistical and mathematical animations from R to GIF, HTML, video and LaTeX. The most recent release adds a single contributed demo; the substantive work — magick-based conversion and resolution control — landed in the 2.6/2.7 pair. Several entries carry near-identical import timestamps, so the visible dates compress the real release history.
What is haven?
haven's release cadence has narrowed to compiler and R-devel upkeep.
haven is the tidyverse's bridge to SPSS, Stata and SAS files, wrapping the C ReadStat library. The last several releases are almost entirely maintenance: syncing vendored ReadStat and patching ahead of R-devel changes. The most recent substantive user-facing work landed in 2.5.2 and earlier.
animation vs haven: editorial side-by-side
animation
0.0ANALYTICS
Contribution-driven maintenance on a package whose last structural change was magick support.
◆ Current state
animation renders statistical and mathematical animations from R to GIF, HTML, video and LaTeX. The most recent release adds a single contributed demo; the substantive work — magick-based conversion and resolution control — landed in the 2.6/2.7 pair. Several entries carry near-identical import timestamps, so the visible dates compress the real release history.
◆ Where it's heading
The package has settled into contribution-driven maintenance: outside users file demos and device fixes, and the maintainer merges them. The direction set in 2.6 — dropping the shell-out to an external ImageMagick install in favour of the magick R package — was the last structural change. Nothing in the entries suggests a redesign is underway.
◆ Prediction
Expect the next release to be another accepted contribution — a demo or a device-specific fix — rather than a change to how animations are produced.
haven
0.0ANALYTICS
haven's release cadence has narrowed to compiler and R-devel upkeep.
◆ Current state
haven is the tidyverse's bridge to SPSS, Stata and SAS files, wrapping the C ReadStat library. The last several releases are almost entirely maintenance: syncing vendored ReadStat and patching ahead of R-devel changes. The most recent substantive user-facing work landed in 2.5.2 and earlier.
◆ Where it's heading
Development has shifted from extending the file-format surface to keeping a C dependency compiling against newer toolchains. The deprecation of write_sas() narrowed that surface deliberately, steering users to write_xpt() because the sas7bdat format is undocumented and unsupported upstream.
◆ Prediction
Expect further ReadStat sync releases triggered by compiler or R-devel breakage rather than new format support or writing features.
Alternatives to animation and haven
Other Analytics products tracked by Sparkpulse, ranked by recent ship velocity. Each card links to a full editorial trajectory and lets you pivot into a head-to-head comparison with either animation or haven.
discrim
discrim settled into a thin engine shim after handing its model definitions to parsnip.
dbparser
dbparser shed its database and CSV writers to become just a DrugBank parser.
desirability2
desirability2 is making multi-metric model selection a first-class tidymodels step.
crosstalk
crosstalk is frozen infrastructure: four releases in five years, mostly CRAN upkeep.
cmdstanr
cmdstanr keeps adding fast approximations beside full HMC, and fighting Windows toolchains.
See all animation alternatives → · See all haven alternatives →
Recent activity from animation and haven
Latest ship moves from both products, interleaved chronologically. ⚡ = editorial spark.
- 11mo agoanimationNew estimate_pi demo added
- 1y agohavenhaven 2.5.5 syncs ReadStat for stricter gcc diagnostics
- 2y agohavenhaven 2.5.4 patches for an upcoming R-devel change
- 3y agohavenhaven 2.5.3 patches for an upcoming R-devel change
- 3y agohavenhaven 2.5.2 fixes SAS catalog reads and deprecates write_sas()
- 3y agohavenhaven 2.5.1 aligns labelled headers and fixes name repair
- 4y agohavenhaven 2.5.0 adds custom variable widths when writing files
- 4y agoanimationani.res now honored by saveHTML(), saveVideo() and any device
- 4y agoanimationGIF conversion via the magick package; new ani.res option
- 4y agoanimationExamples stripped from the package to pass CRAN checks
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between animation and haven?
Both compete on the same themes — r — within Analytics. animation and haven are shipping at a similar cadence (velocity 0.0 vs 0.0, both within Sparkpulse's "active" band). See the at-a-glance table above for a side-by-side breakdown of velocity, recent sparks, and editorial themes.
Is animation better than haven?
Sparkpulse doesn't pick a winner — we score release velocity, not feature parity. animation and haven are shipping at a similar cadence (velocity 0.0 vs 0.0, both within Sparkpulse's "active" band). For your specific use case, the alternatives sections above list other Analytics products to evaluate alongside.
What are the best alternatives to animation?
Top animation alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "animation alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/animation for the full list with editorial commentary on each.
What are the best alternatives to haven?
Top haven alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "haven alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/haven for the full list with editorial commentary on each.