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Comparison · Analytics
FedData vs ymlthis
A side-by-side editorial comparison of FedData and ymlthis — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.
FedData vs ymlthis: at a glance
What is FedData?
FedData has spent two major versions migrating US federal geodata off R's retiring spatial stack.
FedData downloads and standardises US federal geospatial datasets — NLCD, NHD, NED, SSURGO, Daymet, GHCN, PAD-US, NASS — into consistent R objects. Two breaking majors define the current package: 3.0.0 moved returns to sf and raster and pulled data from cloud-optimised GeoTIFFs, and 4.0.0 finished the job by dropping sp and raster entirely for terra and sf. Recent releases are dataset refreshes, most recently PAD-US 4.0.
What is ymlthis?
ymlthis retired itself, naming Quarto as the reason it no longer needs to exist.
ymlthis built R Markdown YAML front matter programmatically — a fluent `yml_*()` interface plus RStudio add-ins, so users did not have to hand-write metadata blocks whose valid fields were scattered across output-format documentation. Version 1.0.0 declares the package retired, with only CRAN-preserving changes to follow, and states the reason plainly: Quarto now provides good YAML support.
FedData vs ymlthis: editorial side-by-side
FedData
0.0ANALYTICS
FedData has spent two major versions migrating US federal geodata off R's retiring spatial stack.
◆ Current state
FedData downloads and standardises US federal geospatial datasets — NLCD, NHD, NED, SSURGO, Daymet, GHCN, PAD-US, NASS — into consistent R objects. Two breaking majors define the current package: 3.0.0 moved returns to sf and raster and pulled data from cloud-optimised GeoTIFFs, and 4.0.0 finished the job by dropping sp and raster entirely for terra and sf. Recent releases are dataset refreshes, most recently PAD-US 4.0.
◆ Where it's heading
The package tracks two moving targets at once: the R spatial stack, which it has now fully migrated onto terra and sf, and the federal agencies whose URLs, file naming and hosting keep shifting. With the dependency migration finished, releases have shrunk to single-dataset updates such as annual NLCD and PAD-US 4.0, which suggests the structural work is done and the ongoing cost is data-source maintenance.
◆ Prediction
Expect continued small releases pinned to new vintages of the underlying federal datasets, plus fixes when an agency moves or reformats a source; no further dependency-level upheaval is visible in these entries.
ymlthis
0.0ANALYTICS
ymlthis retired itself, naming Quarto as the reason it no longer needs to exist.
◆ Current state
ymlthis built R Markdown YAML front matter programmatically — a fluent `yml_*()` interface plus RStudio add-ins, so users did not have to hand-write metadata blocks whose valid fields were scattered across output-format documentation. Version 1.0.0 declares the package retired, with only CRAN-preserving changes to follow, and states the reason plainly: Quarto now provides good YAML support.
◆ Where it's heading
The retirement is the endpoint of a long drift. Between 2020 and 2022 every release was reactive — patching around a crayon update that mangled rendered YAML, tracking shiny 1.6, following roxygen2 7.0.0, fixing a typo in an add-in. No new capability has landed in six years, and the four-year gap before 1.0.0 had already answered the question the release note finally makes explicit.
◆ Prediction
Nothing further of substance is expected — the stated policy is changes only where CRAN requires them, so the next release, if any, will be a compatibility patch.
Alternatives to FedData and ymlthis
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 FedData or ymlthis.
DoseFinding
New stewardship at openpharma, then two releases adding the methods MCP-Mod was missing
webmockr
The stubbing library added httr2 support, then spent a year cutting itself free of everything else
crul
crul took mocking back from webmockr and made it a property of the client itself
dendroNetwork
Six releases, six identical bodies — the feed carries the package abstract instead of release notes
chattr
chattr deleted every LLM integration it had written and outsourced the lot to ellmer
See all FedData alternatives → · See all ymlthis alternatives →
Recent activity from FedData and ymlthis
Latest ship moves from both products, interleaved chronologically. ⚡ = editorial spark.
- 5mo agoymlthisymlthis retired; Quarto covers the need ⚡
- 1y agoFedDataget_padus() updated to PAD-US 4.0
- 1y agoFedDataAnnual NLCD access added; get_nass() retired
- 2y agoFedDatasp and raster dropped; everything returns terra or sf ⚡
- 3y agoFedDataGHCN moves to https; NHD handles empty and odd geometries
- 3y agoFedDataAll raster writing moves to terra
- 3y agoFedDataVersion 3 rebuilds on sf and cloud-optimised GeoTIFFs ⚡
- 4y agoymlthisTypo fixed in the miniUI add-in check
- 4y agoymlthisyml_author() accepts yml_blank(); shiny fixes
- 4y agoymlthisciteproc handling moved to newer rmarkdown functions
- 5y agoymlthisPatched a crayon update that mangled rendered YAML
- 5y agoymlthisAdjustments for shiny 1.6
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between FedData and ymlthis?
They serve adjacent needs but don't currently overlap on shipped themes. FedData and ymlthis 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 FedData better than ymlthis?
Sparkpulse doesn't pick a winner — we score release velocity, not feature parity. FedData and ymlthis 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 FedData?
Top FedData alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "FedData alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/feddata for the full list with editorial commentary on each.
What are the best alternatives to ymlthis?
Top ymlthis alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "ymlthis alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/ymlthis for the full list with editorial commentary on each.