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Comparison · Infra & APIs
cofad vs stRoke
A side-by-side editorial comparison of cofad and stRoke — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.
cofad vs stRoke: at a glance
What is cofad?
Contrast analysis with a Shiny front end, shipping about one release a year
cofad performs contrast analyses for factorial designs in both between- and within-subject forms, and ships a Shiny GUI alongside the R interface. The 0.3.0 release in 2024 was the substantial one: a helper for calculating differences between two sets of lambdas for competing contrast analysis, improved summary output, removal of the plyr dependency, a rebuilt Shiny interface using standard elements after the sortable drag-and-drop proved unstable, and a change of maintainer to Johannes Titz. The most recent release is a one-line patch fixing degrees of freedom in the t-test table.
What is stRoke?
Split itself in two, keeping the stroke-trial functions and exporting the rest
stRoke is now deliberately narrow: functions for handling clinical stroke trial data, mostly questionnaire scoring such as pase_calc() for PASE and mfi_calc() for MFI domain scores. It reached that state by subtraction — the 24.10.1 release moved eight general-purpose helpers out to a separate package, project.aid, and stated the change of focus in the notes. The most recent release, 25.9.1, is an eighty-character note about accommodating upcoming ggplot2 changes.
cofad vs stRoke: editorial side-by-side
cofad
0.0INFRA · APIS
Contrast analysis with a Shiny front end, shipping about one release a year
◆ Current state
cofad performs contrast analyses for factorial designs in both between- and within-subject forms, and ships a Shiny GUI alongside the R interface. The 0.3.0 release in 2024 was the substantial one: a helper for calculating differences between two sets of lambdas for competing contrast analysis, improved summary output, removal of the plyr dependency, a rebuilt Shiny interface using standard elements after the sortable drag-and-drop proved unstable, and a change of maintainer to Johannes Titz. The most recent release is a one-line patch fixing degrees of freedom in the t-test table.
◆ Where it's heading
Development is slow and correctness-led. The record runs from a JOSS publication in 2021 through a near three-year gap to a release that both extended the method and repaired the GUI, then a degrees-of-freedom fix. Maintainer and author order changed in 0.3.0, which typically marks a handover rather than a burst of new work, and the cadence since is consistent with that.
◆ Prediction
Expect low-frequency correctness releases; the competing contrast analysis helper added in 0.3.0 is the most likely thing to be extended if anything is.
stRoke
0.0INFRA · APIS
Split itself in two, keeping the stroke-trial functions and exporting the rest
◆ Current state
stRoke is now deliberately narrow: functions for handling clinical stroke trial data, mostly questionnaire scoring such as pase_calc() for PASE and mfi_calc() for MFI domain scores. It reached that state by subtraction — the 24.10.1 release moved eight general-purpose helpers out to a separate package, project.aid, and stated the change of focus in the notes. The most recent release, 25.9.1, is an eighty-character note about accommodating upcoming ggplot2 changes.
◆ Where it's heading
The package uses calendar versioning and its history is one of scope being repeatedly redrawn: ds2dd() went to REDCapCAST in 2023, then the general data and project management helpers went to project.aid in 2024. What remains is domain-specific and slow-moving, and the past eleven months produced a single compatibility release. The maintainer's visible effort has moved to the sibling packages.
◆ Prediction
Expect further questionnaire scoring functions if the maintainer's own trials need them and compatibility releases otherwise; on the pattern set in 24.10.1, more of the remaining general-purpose functions could still migrate to project.aid.
Alternatives to cofad and stRoke
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 cofad or stRoke.
Cursor
Cursor's agents stop waiting to be asked - they subscribe, and they hold a goal until it's done.
incident.io
Nexus does the diagnosis; the agent is now reaching into the status page too.
Warp
Warp turned its quarter of software-factory essays into infrastructure you can buy.
Okta
Okta's developer blog is a Cross App Access campaign, now diluted by advocacy-team storytelling.
tealeaves
A leaf-temperature model that finished its job in 2020 and has stayed finished
See all cofad alternatives → · See all stRoke alternatives →
Recent activity from cofad and stRoke
Latest ship moves from both products, interleaved chronologically. ⚡ = editorial spark.
- 10mo agostRokeCompatibility update for upcoming ggplot2 changes
- 1y agocofadDegrees of freedom corrected in the t-test table
- 1y agostRokeScope narrowed to stroke trials; eight helpers moved to project.aid ⚡
- 2y agocofadCompeting contrast helper, rebuilt Shiny GUI, maintainer change
- 2y agostRokeChunking, string extraction and padding helpers added
- 3y agostRokeFix for ds2dd() after first practical use
- 3y agostRokePASE questionnaire scoring with data-quality checks
- 3y agostRokeFirst release: color_plot() built on contrast_text()
- 4y agocofadDocumentation and references for JOSS publication
- 4y agocofadShiny GUI added; aggregated-data function and 0-variance fix
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between cofad and stRoke?
They serve adjacent needs but don't currently overlap on shipped themes. cofad and stRoke 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 cofad better than stRoke?
Sparkpulse doesn't pick a winner — we score release velocity, not feature parity. cofad and stRoke 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 Infra & APIs products to evaluate alongside.
What are the best alternatives to cofad?
Top cofad alternatives in Infra & APIs are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "cofad alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/cofad for the full list with editorial commentary on each.
What are the best alternatives to stRoke?
Top stRoke alternatives in Infra & APIs are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "stRoke alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/stroke for the full list with editorial commentary on each.