rjd3highfreq
rjd3highfreq ships whatever the Java side ships, and only occasionally says what that was.
Comparison · Analytics
ardlverse vs mrbayes
A side-by-side editorial comparison of ardlverse and mrbayes — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.
Shared themes:r-package
ardlverse vs mrbayes: at a glance
What is ardlverse?
An outside audit against Stata found seven errors in ardlverse's panel estimator, including regressions with no intercept.
A small R package for autoregressive distributed lag models, with only three releases on record. The first two were administrative — a CRAN version note and a Zenodo metadata update. The third, 2.0.0, is a correction release built entirely from an external audit of panel_ardl() against Stata's xtpmg, and it is the only entry here with substantive content.
What is mrbayes?
mrbayes spent 2026 auditing its own Bayesian MR estimators for coding errors.
mrbayes wraps Stan and JAGS implementations of Bayesian Mendelian randomization estimators — IVW, MR-Egger, radial Egger, and their multivariable forms. Most of the visible history is packaging work: dependency trimming, conditional examples so the package installs where JAGS will not compile, a maintainer handover. The 0.5.3 release in July 2026 breaks that pattern with a dense list of fixes inside the model code itself.
ardlverse vs mrbayes: editorial side-by-side
ardlverse
0.0ANALYTICS
An outside audit against Stata found seven errors in ardlverse's panel estimator, including regressions with no intercept.
◆ Current state
A small R package for autoregressive distributed lag models, with only three releases on record. The first two were administrative — a CRAN version note and a Zenodo metadata update. The third, 2.0.0, is a correction release built entirely from an external audit of panel_ardl() against Stata's xtpmg, and it is the only entry here with substantive content.
◆ Where it's heading
The package's direction is now set by verification against an established reference implementation rather than by feature work. The seven fixes bring panel_ardl() into strict alignment with the original Pesaran, Shin and Smith framework, and the most serious of them is structural: internal regressions used lm.fit(), which unlike lm() does not append an intercept, so every short-run regression across the PMG, MG and DFE estimators was forced through the origin. Design matrices now carry a column of ones and DFE reconstructs the grand-mean intercept to match standard fixed-effects output.
◆ Prediction
Expect the next releases to extend the same audit approach to the remaining estimators, since a package that has been validated against xtpmg on one function invites the same question about the rest.
mrbayes
0.0ANALYTICS
mrbayes spent 2026 auditing its own Bayesian MR estimators for coding errors.
◆ Current state
mrbayes wraps Stan and JAGS implementations of Bayesian Mendelian randomization estimators — IVW, MR-Egger, radial Egger, and their multivariable forms. Most of the visible history is packaging work: dependency trimming, conditional examples so the package installs where JAGS will not compile, a maintainer handover. The 0.5.3 release in July 2026 breaks that pattern with a dense list of fixes inside the model code itself.
◆ Where it's heading
The package has moved from packaging upkeep into a correctness-audit phase. 0.5.3 fixes a hardcoded three-exposure loop in MVMR-Egger reporting, a broken joint-prior branch, a sigma parameterization error in radial Egger, and several prior specifications — the profile of a maintainer reading their own model files closely rather than responding to bug reports. Platform work continues underneath: an R 4.3.0 floor inherited through a transitive dependency chain, and segfault fixes on macOS ARM.
◆ Prediction
Expect further audit-driven patches to the remaining rjags and Stan model files rather than new estimators; the fixes in 0.5.3 cluster in the Egger variants, which suggests that is where the reading is still in progress.
Alternatives to ardlverse and mrbayes
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 ardlverse or mrbayes.
audubon
audubon's release feed is almost entirely Renovate bumping the JavaScript toolchain behind its Japanese text splitter.
affiner
affiner is quietly turning a grid transformation helper into a small computational geometry library.
ageproR
ageproR spent two years chasing a moving file format, then added the recruitment models that justify the effort.
r-ledger
ledger adds a Rust toolchain fallback, so beancount imports work whether or not the Python tooling is installed.
gridpattern
gridpattern keeps widening its catalogue, and the newest patterns finally use the device's own line rendering.
See all ardlverse alternatives → · See all mrbayes alternatives →
Recent activity from ardlverse and mrbayes
Latest ship moves from both products, interleaved chronologically. ⚡ = editorial spark.
- 1mo agomrbayesEstimator audit fixes MVMR-Egger loops and radial Egger sigma
- 1mo agoardlverseSeven panel_ardl fixes after an audit against Stata's xtpmg
- 5mo agoardlverseZenodo metadata updated with ORCID
- 5mo agoardlverseardlverse v1.1.3
- 1y agomrbayesMVMR rjags example gated on rjags being installed
- 1y agomrbayesExamples and tests skip when rstan or rjags is missing
- 1y agomrbayespkgdown site updated
- 1y agomrbayesHelper command added for installing JAGS
- 1y agomrbayesDependency surface trimmed; maintainer handover
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between ardlverse and mrbayes?
Both compete on the same themes — r-package — within Analytics. ardlverse and mrbayes 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 ardlverse better than mrbayes?
Sparkpulse doesn't pick a winner — we score release velocity, not feature parity. ardlverse and mrbayes 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 ardlverse?
Top ardlverse alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "ardlverse alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/ardlverse-r for the full list with editorial commentary on each.
What are the best alternatives to mrbayes?
Top mrbayes alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "mrbayes alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/mrbayes for the full list with editorial commentary on each.