simlandr
Potential landscape tooling settling onto standard R generics after two rounds of renaming.
Comparison · Analytics
collinear vs lavaanExtra
A side-by-side editorial comparison of collinear and lavaanExtra — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.
collinear vs lavaanExtra: at a glance
What is collinear?
collinear has broken its API twice to stop making the user pick thresholds.
collinear removes multicollinearity from predictor sets through pairwise correlation and VIF filtering, with a preference order deciding which variable survives each conflict. Two major versions in thirteen months each rewrote the interface: 2.0.0 extended every function to any combination of categorical and numeric responses and predictors, and 3.0.0 moved to multiple responses, restructured the output into classed objects, and made both filtering thresholds adaptive by default. Version 3.0.1 is the first release since that is purely repair.
What is lavaanExtra?
SEM reporting helpers converging on APA output, one CRAN resubmission at a time.
lavaanExtra provides shorthand syntax and formatted output around lavaan structural equation models - write_lavaan() to build model strings, and nice_* functions for fit tables, plots, and modification indices. Three of the six visible releases exist only to satisfy CRAN resubmission: a unicode problem, a dependency version check, tests running without suggested packages. The substance sits in 0.1.5, 0.1.8, and 0.1.9.
collinear vs lavaanExtra: editorial side-by-side
collinear
0.0ANALYTICS
collinear has broken its API twice to stop making the user pick thresholds.
◆ Current state
collinear removes multicollinearity from predictor sets through pairwise correlation and VIF filtering, with a preference order deciding which variable survives each conflict. Two major versions in thirteen months each rewrote the interface: 2.0.0 extended every function to any combination of categorical and numeric responses and predictors, and 3.0.0 moved to multiple responses, restructured the output into classed objects, and made both filtering thresholds adaptive by default. Version 3.0.1 is the first release since that is purely repair.
◆ Where it's heading
The through-line is removing decisions the user was never well placed to make. Preference-order functions were renamed twice — first onto a metric-and-model scheme in 2.0.0, then onto a response-type scheme in 3.0.0 — and f_auto() picks one when none is given; target encoding went from automatic to opt-in; max_cor and max_vif now default to NULL and trigger a data-driven threshold derived from the 75th percentile of pairwise correlations through a sigmoid and a fitted correlation-to-VIF mapping. Each change is defensible and each one broke callers, which is the cost of this approach.
◆ Prediction
3.0.1 moved the example datasets out into a separate spatialData package and fixed four crashes rather than adding anything, so the next release is most likely more consolidation on the 3.0 surface than a fourth interface.
lavaanExtra
0.0ANALYTICS
SEM reporting helpers converging on APA output, one CRAN resubmission at a time.
◆ Current state
lavaanExtra provides shorthand syntax and formatted output around lavaan structural equation models - write_lavaan() to build model strings, and nice_* functions for fit tables, plots, and modification indices. Three of the six visible releases exist only to satisfy CRAN resubmission: a unicode problem, a dependency version check, tests running without suggested packages. The substance sits in 0.1.5, 0.1.8, and 0.1.9.
◆ Where it's heading
The package generalises its own vocabulary as it goes: lavaan_ind() became lavaan_defined() once it turned out to extract any user-defined parameter, and lavaan_cov() was split so lavaan_cor() covers actual correlations. Methodological positions are taken alongside the API - dropping the estimate argument from lavaan_reg() to force reporting both standardized and unstandardized values, and updating the RMSEA benchmark to Schreiber (2017). Rémi Thériault maintains it next to rempsyc, which formats output to match. Note that 0.1.5 restates the whole 0.1.4.x development series in one body.
◆ Prediction
The pattern points to another nice_* helper aimed at a reporting step that currently needs hand formatting, arriving with the usual CRAN resubmission behind it.
Alternatives to collinear and lavaanExtra
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 collinear or lavaanExtra.
ibis.iSDM
A raster-to-terra migration is the only readable change in a feed of merge notes.
anyflights
A nycflights13 generator whose recent work is all about the data being right.
vinereg
Conditional density and log-likelihood fill out a vine copula regression package.
stringx
A drop-in string API for base R, kept alive by upstream check failures.
healthyR.data
From a bundled hospital dataset to a live CMS API client.
See all collinear alternatives → · See all lavaanExtra alternatives →
Recent activity from collinear and lavaanExtra
Latest ship moves from both products, interleaved chronologically. ⚡ = editorial spark.
- 3mo agocollinearNamespace, NA and sf fixes; example data moves to spatialData
- 8mo agocollinearAdaptive thresholds, multi-response support and a new output class ⚡
- 1y agocollinearCategorical responses, f_auto() defaults and future-based parallelism ⚡
- 2y agolavaanExtraCRAN resubmission for a unicode problem
- 2y agolavaanExtralavaan_ind renamed to lavaan_defined; thresholds supported
- 2y agolavaanExtranice_modindices flags redundant items
- 3y agolavaanExtraSuggested dependency versions checked correctly
- 3y agolavaanExtraTests run without suggested dependencies
- 3y agolavaanExtraFit benchmarks updated and correlations split from covariances
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between collinear and lavaanExtra?
They serve adjacent needs but don't currently overlap on shipped themes. collinear and lavaanExtra 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 collinear better than lavaanExtra?
Sparkpulse doesn't pick a winner — we score release velocity, not feature parity. collinear and lavaanExtra 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 collinear?
Top collinear alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "collinear alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/collinear for the full list with editorial commentary on each.
What are the best alternatives to lavaanExtra?
Top lavaanExtra alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "lavaanExtra alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/lavaanextra for the full list with editorial commentary on each.