cIRT
A choice-based IRT model published once in 2019 and kept compiling ever since
Comparison · Analytics
common vs dcurves
A side-by-side editorial comparison of common and dcurves — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.
Shared themes:r-package
common vs dcurves: at a glance
What is common?
A base-R utility belt that grows one small function at a time, on no particular schedule
common collects small helpers that base R leaves out — data frame labelling and sorting, infix operators for pasting and equality, UTF-8 superscript and subscript lookups, file and directory search, attribute copying between data frames. It has no dependencies to speak of and deliberately removed the one it had. In practice it is the shared substrate for its author's wider package family, and its source.all() function is maintained specifically to cooperate with the logr logging package.
What is dcurves?
Decision curve analysis, settled since 2022 and now moving only when its neighbours do
dcurves implements decision curve analysis — evaluating a prediction model or diagnostic test by net benefit across the range of thresholds a clinician might plausibly use, rather than by a single discrimination statistic. Its API stabilised in 2022 around dca() and test_consequences(). The two releases since exist because gtsummary and CRAN documentation rules changed, not because the method did.
common vs dcurves: editorial side-by-side
common
0.0ANALYTICS
A base-R utility belt that grows one small function at a time, on no particular schedule
◆ Current state
common collects small helpers that base R leaves out — data frame labelling and sorting, infix operators for pasting and equality, UTF-8 superscript and subscript lookups, file and directory search, attribute copying between data frames. It has no dependencies to speak of and deliberately removed the one it had. In practice it is the shared substrate for its author's wider package family, and its source.all() function is maintained specifically to cooperate with the logr logging package.
◆ Where it's heading
The pattern is accretion rather than direction: each release adds a couple of utilities and fixes whatever the last batch broke, with gaps of a year or more between them. Function additions cluster around whatever the author's other packages needed at the time — file search, attribute preservation, group-boundary detection, script sourcing. The 2025 release continues exactly this, extending the infix comparison operators from equality alone to the full set of relational tests.
◆ Prediction
Expect more of the same shape — a handful of small helpers whenever a sibling package needs them — with no sign in these entries of a broader API push.
dcurves
0.0ANALYTICS
Decision curve analysis, settled since 2022 and now moving only when its neighbours do
◆ Current state
dcurves implements decision curve analysis — evaluating a prediction model or diagnostic test by net benefit across the range of thresholds a clinician might plausibly use, rather than by a single discrimination statistic. Its API stabilised in 2022 around dca() and test_consequences(). The two releases since exist because gtsummary and CRAN documentation rules changed, not because the method did.
◆ Where it's heading
The package reached its intended scope quickly and then stopped. Its 2022 releases did the substantive work: adding threshold-level diagnostic accuracy, tightening argument validation, and taking one breaking change to make net-interventions-avoided plots show the treat-all and treat-none reference lines by default. Since then it has moved only as a dependent of the wider tidy-modelling documentation ecosystem it plugs into.
◆ Prediction
Nothing in these entries points to method or API work; expect the next release to be another compatibility or CRAN documentation patch.
Alternatives to common and dcurves
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 common or dcurves.
MetaboAnalystR
The R engine behind MetaboAnalyst closes the gap from raw spectra to biological interpretation
fmtr
Rebuilding SAS's formatting layer in R, one format specification at a time
betaselectr
Standardised coefficients for models where standardising everything is wrong — but the feed only links out
SSN2
Stream-network spatial models learning to run on data that no longer fits in memory
BiocManager
Bioconductor's installer, frozen at 1.30.x and tuned almost entirely through environment variables
See all common alternatives → · See all dcurves alternatives →
Recent activity from common and dcurves
Latest ship moves from both products, interleaved chronologically. ⚡ = editorial spark.
- 8mo agocommonFull set of relational infix operators added
- 9mo agodcurvesHTML5 documentation rebuild for CRAN
- 2y agodcurvesbroom.helpers added to Suggests for gtsummary 2.0
- 2y agocommonsource.all() fixed to cooperate with logr
- 2y agocommonsource.all() added for sourcing a directory of scripts
- 2y agocommonchanged() fixed for single-value input
- 2y agocommonchanged() identifies grouping boundaries
- 3y agocommonthis.path() dependency removed
- 3y agodcurvesNet interventions plots now show treat-all and treat-none by default
- 4y agodcurvestest_consequences() reports accuracy across thresholds
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between common and dcurves?
Both compete on the same themes — r-package — within Analytics. common and dcurves 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 common better than dcurves?
Sparkpulse doesn't pick a winner — we score release velocity, not feature parity. common and dcurves 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 common?
Top common alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "common alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/common for the full list with editorial commentary on each.
What are the best alternatives to dcurves?
Top dcurves alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "dcurves alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/dcurves for the full list with editorial commentary on each.