glyexp
glyexp is retiring its own data container and handing the job to Bioconductor.
Comparison · Analytics
constants vs vellumwidget
A side-by-side editorial comparison of constants and vellumwidget — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.
constants vs vellumwidget: at a glance
What is constants?
The R package for CODATA constants rebuilt its symbol table on NIST's naming so future updates stop being hand work.
constants exposes the CODATA recommended values of the physical constants to R, as a data frame plus symbol lists that carry units, uncertainties, or both. The package reached 1.0.0 on the 2018 CODATA release and has shipped once since, purely to track a units package update. Its surface is small and its release cadence is bound to CODATA, which revises every few years.
What is vellumwidget?
vellumwidget is dissolving its own API: interaction now lives in the plot spec, not the widget call.
vellumwidget compiles a vellum scene or a vellumplot plot into a self-contained client-side htmlwidget with hover, select, brush, lasso, pan/zoom and export, and no server round-trip. The two-way Shiny story is complete: interactions surface as reactive inputs keyed by output id, and vellumwidget_proxy() drives an already-rendered widget from the server without re-rendering it. The last two releases are fidelity work rather than new surface, calibrating hit-testing from the rendered positions of marks and rendering the raster base image at 2x for HiDPI screens.
constants vs vellumwidget: editorial side-by-side
constants
0.0ANALYTICS
The R package for CODATA constants rebuilt its symbol table on NIST's naming so future updates stop being hand work.
◆ Current state
constants exposes the CODATA recommended values of the physical constants to R, as a data frame plus symbol lists that carry units, uncertainties, or both. The package reached 1.0.0 on the 2018 CODATA release and has shipped once since, purely to track a units package update. Its surface is small and its release cadence is bound to CODATA, which revises every few years.
◆ Where it's heading
The direction set at 1.0.0 was to stop being a curated convenience wrapper and become a mechanical mirror of NIST. Hand-crafted symbol names were replaced with NIST's own ASCII symbols, categories adopted NIST's, and uncertainty switched from relative to absolute — all framed by the maintainer as necessary to make future CODATA updates routine. On top of that the package gained a correlation matrix and optional integration with the quantities package, moving it from a lookup table toward something that can propagate uncertainty.
◆ Prediction
Having rebuilt the symbol table specifically so CODATA revisions become mechanical, the next substantive release most likely tracks a new CODATA dataset rather than adding API. The experimental correlated-value support, disabled by default at 1.0.0, is the one part these entries flag as unfinished.
vellumwidget
6.3ANALYTICS
vellumwidget is dissolving its own API: interaction now lives in the plot spec, not the widget call.
◆ Current state
vellumwidget compiles a vellum scene or a vellumplot plot into a self-contained client-side htmlwidget with hover, select, brush, lasso, pan/zoom and export, and no server round-trip. The two-way Shiny story is complete: interactions surface as reactive inputs keyed by output id, and vellumwidget_proxy() drives an already-rendered widget from the server without re-rendering it. The last two releases are fidelity work rather than new surface, calibrating hit-testing from the rendered positions of marks and rendering the raster base image at 2x for HiDPI screens.
◆ Where it's heading
The direction is declarative. 0.7.0 removed the interaction-intent arguments from as_widget() outright, dropping the signature from roughly 36 arguments to 24 and moving highlight, filter and cross-filter into vellumplot's spec via select_point(), condition() and filter_by(). Each release since has enacted more of that compiled spec on the frozen scene, from conditional encodings to single-view filters to cross-view cross-filtering, leaving the widget as an interpreter of the plot rather than a configuration surface of its own. The bug fixes track the same theme the engine's do: measured geometry and rendered geometry must not drift.
◆ Prediction
The notes name the remaining hold-outs explicitly, saying hover_mode, crosshair, legend_click, select_mode and the tooltip-appearance arguments remain only until their spec equivalents land, so the next releases most likely move those into vellumplot and shrink as_widget() further. The scale binds flagged as following the filter work are the other stated next step.
Alternatives to constants and vellumwidget
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 constants or vellumwidget.
glymotif
A glycan motif matcher trading convenience wrappers for speed, strictness and explicit specs.
glyrepr
The type system the rest of the glycan stack is built on, being hardened one breaking change at a time.
glyanno
Glycan annotation stops depending on the database having seen the structure before.
glydraw
SNFG glycan cartoons stopped being pictures and became ggplot2 geoms, guides and axis labels.
glyenzy
Glycan biosynthesis as a traceable enzyme graph, now including sulfation and gaps it can bridge.
See all constants alternatives → · See all vellumwidget alternatives →
Recent activity from constants and vellumwidget
Latest ship moves from both products, interleaved chronologically. ⚡ = editorial spark.
- 14d agovellumwidget2x raster base image for HiDPI, and exact element hit-testing
- 20d agovellumwidgetInteraction moves into the plot spec; as_widget() sheds a third of its arguments ⚡
- 27d agovellumwidgetAxis-aware zoom re-ticks the axes instead of scaling the whole scene
- 1mo agovellumwidgetSelectable native SVG text, and crisp canvas redraw when zooming raster
- 1mo agovellumwidgetServer-side proxy drives a rendered widget without re-rendering it
- 1mo agovellumwidgetShiny input read-back, and keyboard plus screen-reader access by default
- 5y agoconstantsCompatibility fix for units 0.7-0
- 5y agoconstantsconstants 1.0.0 ⚡
- 8y agoconstantsUnit handling fixes ahead of the 1.0.0 rebuild
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between constants and vellumwidget?
They serve adjacent needs but don't currently overlap on shipped themes. vellumwidget is currently shipping more aggressively (velocity 6.3 vs 0.0), with 1 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 constants better than vellumwidget?
Sparkpulse doesn't pick a winner — we score release velocity, not feature parity. vellumwidget is currently shipping more aggressively (velocity 6.3 vs 0.0), with 1 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 constants?
Top constants alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "constants alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/constants-r for the full list with editorial commentary on each.
What are the best alternatives to vellumwidget?
Top vellumwidget alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "vellumwidget alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/vellumwidget for the full list with editorial commentary on each.