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bbotk vs yardstick

A side-by-side editorial comparison of bbotk and yardstick — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.

bbotk vs yardstick: at a glance

Featurebbotkyardstick
SectorAnalyticsAnalytics
Velocity score2.50.0
Sparks · 30d00
Top themesblack-box optimization, mlr3, async execution, api deprecationmetrics, tidymodels, fairness, survival-analysis
Last editorial update54m ago1h ago
WebsiteVisit →Visit →

What is bbotk?

bbotk is generalizing from an optimizer toolkit into an evaluation framework.

bbotk is the black-box optimization backend behind mlr3 tuning: search spaces, terminators, archives, and an async layer built on rush. Recent releases pair steady async-API buildout with removal of the deprecated arguments that preceded it. The 1.9.0 release introduced EvalInstance as a base class for OptimInstance, separating evaluating an objective from optimizing one.

Read the full bbotk trajectory →

What is yardstick?

yardstick made fairness metrics a first-class part of tidymodels evaluation

yardstick supplies the metrics tidymodels evaluates models with. Its recent history is metric expansion into areas the package did not originally cover - survival analysis, model fairness, and in 1.4.0 a batch of regression and classification metrics filling remaining gaps - alongside a long deprecation cycle that finally turned errors on in 1.4.0.

Read the full yardstick trajectory →

bbotk vs yardstick: editorial side-by-side

B
bbotk
ANALYTICS
2.5

bbotk is generalizing from an optimizer toolkit into an evaluation framework.

◆ Current state

bbotk is the black-box optimization backend behind mlr3 tuning: search spaces, terminators, archives, and an async layer built on rush. Recent releases pair steady async-API buildout with removal of the deprecated arguments that preceded it. The 1.9.0 release introduced EvalInstance as a base class for OptimInstance, separating evaluating an objective from optimizing one.

◆ Where it's heading

Two threads run through the visible history. The first is async optimization maturing: ArchiveAsync gained a full push/finish/fail vocabulary over rush tasks in 1.11.0, and 1.12.0 deleted the deprecated extra arguments it replaced. The second is dependency consolidation, with custom C hypervolume code handed to moocore and rush pinned to 1.0.0, trimming maintenance surface as the async path becomes the default.

◆ Prediction

The deprecation removals in 1.12.0 suggest the async archive API is now treated as settled; the next releases most likely build on EvalInstance rather than continuing to churn ArchiveAsync.

Y
yardstick
ANALYTICS
0.0

yardstick made fairness metrics a first-class part of tidymodels evaluation

◆ Current state

yardstick supplies the metrics tidymodels evaluates models with. Its recent history is metric expansion into areas the package did not originally cover - survival analysis, model fairness, and in 1.4.0 a batch of regression and classification metrics filling remaining gaps - alongside a long deprecation cycle that finally turned errors on in 1.4.0.

◆ Where it's heading

The direction is coverage plus extensibility. Rather than adding fairness metrics one at a time, 1.3.0 shipped new_groupwise_metric() so group-aware metrics can be defined for the problem at hand, which is the more durable contribution. The parallel thread is removing hidden state: the event_first global option, deprecated in 0.0.7, took until 1.4.0 to become an error.

◆ Prediction

Expect the groupwise constructor to attract more fairness definitions than the three shipped, and the developer-facing metric creation helpers deprecated in 1.2.0 to be removed next; core metric coverage now looks close to complete.

Alternatives to bbotk and yardstick

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 bbotk or yardstick.

See all bbotk alternatives → · See all yardstick alternatives →

Recent activity from bbotk and yardstick

Latest ship moves from both products, interleaved chronologically. ⚡ = editorial spark.

  1. 24d agobbotkDeprecated extra argument removed from ArchiveAsync methods
  2. 1mo agobbotkArchiveAsync gains full push/finish/fail task API over rush
  3. 2mo agobbotkDominance and hypervolume computation moved to moocore
  4. 4mo agobbotkmlr_test_functions adds standard optimization benchmarks
  5. 4mo agoyardstickAdds Gini, MSE and rate metrics; old deprecations now error
  6. 5mo agobbotkEvalInstance base class separates evaluation from optimization
  7. 8mo agobbotkFix: conditions now work with OptimizerLocalSearch
  8. 1y agoyardstickAll messages translated to cli
  9. 2y agoyardstickFixes wrong weights in roc_curve_survival()
  10. 2y agoyardstickFairness metrics and a groupwise metric constructor
  11. 3y agoyardstickBrier score for classification; tidyselect interface throughout
  12. 3y agoyardstickNew maintainer; clearer metric_set() errors

Frequently asked questions

What is the difference between bbotk and yardstick?

They serve adjacent needs but don't currently overlap on shipped themes. bbotk 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 bbotk better than yardstick?

Sparkpulse doesn't pick a winner — we score release velocity, not feature parity. bbotk 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 Analytics products to evaluate alongside.

What are the best alternatives to bbotk?

Top bbotk alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "bbotk alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/bbotk for the full list with editorial commentary on each.

What are the best alternatives to yardstick?

Top yardstick alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "yardstick alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/yardstick for the full list with editorial commentary on each.