ggpointless
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Comparison · Infra & APIs
artoo vs PowerTOST
A side-by-side editorial comparison of artoo and PowerTOST — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.
artoo vs PowerTOST: at a glance
What is artoo?
artoo makes any-to-any clinical dataset conversion lossless by construction.
artoo reads and writes SAS XPORT, CDISC Dataset-JSON, NDJSON, Parquet and RDS around one canonical metadata model, so a conversion between any two formats carries labels, CDISC types, lengths, display formats, controlled-terminology references and sort keys intact. It is pure R with no SAS or Java runtime. It reached CRAN at 0.1.1 and has spent 0.1.2 and 0.1.3 on the character-encoding edges.
What is PowerTOST?
A bioequivalence sample-size workhorse whose news is which regulator it now covers
PowerTOST computes power and sample size for bioequivalence and its changelog reads as a record of regulatory divergence more than statistical development. Version 1.5-3 added the Gulf Co-operation Council as a regulator setting; 1.5-4 and 1.5-6 stripped 'FDA' out of the narrow-therapeutic-index function names once China's CDE began requiring the same evaluation. The most recent release, 1.5-7, is a single fix to how nvec() splits a total sample size across sequences.
artoo vs PowerTOST: editorial side-by-side
artoo
2.5INFRA · APIS
artoo makes any-to-any clinical dataset conversion lossless by construction.
◆ Current state
artoo reads and writes SAS XPORT, CDISC Dataset-JSON, NDJSON, Parquet and RDS around one canonical metadata model, so a conversion between any two formats carries labels, CDISC types, lengths, display formats, controlled-terminology references and sort keys intact. It is pure R with no SAS or Java runtime. It reached CRAN at 0.1.1 and has spent 0.1.2 and 0.1.3 on the character-encoding edges.
◆ Where it's heading
Recent work is all about text that does not survive a format change. 0.1.3 adds an invalid_encoding dimension to artoo_checks() that flags bytes which are not valid UTF-8 before a writer aborts on them, accepts the SAS OEM/DOS encoding names, and gives the writers on_invalid = "translit" and "fold" so smart punctuation and accented characters resolve to pinned ASCII instead of failing. The fold tables ship as data specifically so the result is identical on every platform, which is the same determinism argument behind C-locale row sorting in 0.1.0.
◆ Prediction
The new WLATIN1-to-UTF-8 migration article and the width warning on write_xpt() point the next attention at length and truncation semantics rather than at additional formats. These notes name no further target format.
PowerTOST
0.0INFRA · APIS
A bioequivalence sample-size workhorse whose news is which regulator it now covers
◆ Current state
PowerTOST computes power and sample size for bioequivalence and its changelog reads as a record of regulatory divergence more than statistical development. Version 1.5-3 added the Gulf Co-operation Council as a regulator setting; 1.5-4 and 1.5-6 stripped 'FDA' out of the narrow-therapeutic-index function names once China's CDE began requiring the same evaluation. The most recent release, 1.5-7, is a single fix to how nvec() splits a total sample size across sequences.
◆ Where it's heading
The package is in long maintenance with a widening regulatory surface: the statistical methods are settled, and releases arrive when an agency publishes a framework that can be expressed as a settings variant of an existing method. Function naming has been deliberately decoupled from any single agency, with the deprecated FDA-suffixed aliases carried for years before removal. Cadence has slowed to roughly one release every eighteen months.
◆ Prediction
The next release is most likely another regulator setting or a small fix; on the deprecation notice already given, the power.NTIDFDA()-style aliases are the obvious removal candidate.
Alternatives to artoo and PowerTOST
Other Infra & APIs 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 artoo or PowerTOST.
mpactr
mpactr spent two spring releases normalizing case in metadata after users kept tripping on it.
surveytidy
surveytidy taught every dplyr verb to operate on a whole collection of surveys at once.
surveycore
surveycore declared its API stable with every survey design type covered.
PEIMAN2
PEIMAN2 cut its annotation database loose from its release cycle without breaking CRAN.
prospectr
prospectr spent its biggest release in years fixing spectra it had been quietly mangling.
See all artoo alternatives → · See all PowerTOST alternatives →
Recent activity from artoo and PowerTOST
Latest ship moves from both products, interleaved chronologically. ⚡ = editorial spark.
- 28d agoartooEncoding checks and translit/fold modes for the writers
- 1mo agoartoonoLD check fix; codec unchanged
- 2mo agoartooInitial CRAN release after resubmission
- 2mo agoartooLossless any-to-any CDISC dataset conversion in pure R ⚡
- 10mo agoPowerTOSTFix for splitting total sample size across sequences
- 2y agoPowerTOSTNTID functions renamed off the FDA acronym; GCC guidance in vignettes
- 4y agoPowerTOSTpower.NTID() aliases added; FDA-suffixed names deprecated
- 5y agoPowerTOSTGulf Co-operation Council added as a regulator setting
- 5y agoPowerTOSTMaintenance release with vignette and documentation clarifications
- 5y agoPowerTOSTstringsAsFactors fix for older R in a vignette example
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between artoo and PowerTOST?
They serve adjacent needs but don't currently overlap on shipped themes. artoo is currently shipping more aggressively (velocity 2.5 vs 0.0), with 0 editorial sparks in the last 30 days against 0. See the at-a-glance table above for a side-by-side breakdown of velocity, recent sparks, and editorial themes.
Is artoo better than PowerTOST?
Sparkpulse doesn't pick a winner — we score release velocity, not feature parity. artoo is currently shipping more aggressively (velocity 2.5 vs 0.0), with 0 editorial sparks in the last 30 days against 0. For your specific use case, the alternatives sections above list other Infra & APIs products to evaluate alongside.
What are the best alternatives to artoo?
Top artoo alternatives in Infra & APIs are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "artoo alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/artoo for the full list with editorial commentary on each.
What are the best alternatives to PowerTOST?
Top PowerTOST alternatives in Infra & APIs are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "PowerTOST alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/powertost for the full list with editorial commentary on each.