HydroPortailStats
France's national flood statistics, ported out of Fortran and into R.
Comparison · Infra & APIs
ipaddress vs profoc
A side-by-side editorial comparison of ipaddress and profoc — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.
Shared themes:rcppr-package
ipaddress vs profoc: at a glance
What is ipaddress?
IP address vectors for R that hit 1.0 and then went quiet.
ipaddress gives R first-class IPv4 and IPv6 vector types with the arithmetic, netmask and subnet operations that come with them, backed by C++. The 1.0.0 release in 2023 was the deliberate breaking cleanup: one result per input from the hostname functions, vectorised subnets(), several arguments forced to be named, and a country_networks() downloader added. Since then the only release has been a testthat deprecation fix.
What is profoc?
A forecast combination package that spun its profiler out into its own project
profoc combines probabilistic forecasts online, using the Bernstein online aggregation family with B-spline smoothing over quantiles and time. The recent releases are infrastructure rather than method: 1.3.4 removed a using namespace arma directive for CRAN compliance and closed a timer edge case, 1.3.3 adjusted the integration with rcpptimer against its now-stable 1.2.0 API. The last release to change what users can do was 1.3.0, which exposed the conline C++ class to R and exported init_experts_list(), make_basis_mats(), make_hat_mats() and post_process_model() so the engine can be driven directly.
ipaddress vs profoc: editorial side-by-side
ipaddress
0.0INFRA · APIS
IP address vectors for R that hit 1.0 and then went quiet.
◆ Current state
ipaddress gives R first-class IPv4 and IPv6 vector types with the arithmetic, netmask and subnet operations that come with them, backed by C++. The 1.0.0 release in 2023 was the deliberate breaking cleanup: one result per input from the hostname functions, vectorised subnets(), several arguments forced to be named, and a country_networks() downloader added. Since then the only release has been a testthat deprecation fix.
◆ Where it's heading
The package reached the interface it wanted and stopped. The five releases before 1.0.0 were almost entirely CRAN check compliance — deprecated C++ calls, HTML5 notes, a Windows toolchain change — with functional work confined to a couple of releases that shed heavy dependencies. That pattern, long compliance runs punctuated by rare interface work, is what the feed shows now.
◆ Prediction
On this cadence the next release is most likely another CRAN or upstream-testing compliance patch; nothing in the entries indicates new functionality in progress.
profoc
0.0INFRA · APIS
A forecast combination package that spun its profiler out into its own project
◆ Current state
profoc combines probabilistic forecasts online, using the Bernstein online aggregation family with B-spline smoothing over quantiles and time. The recent releases are infrastructure rather than method: 1.3.4 removed a using namespace arma directive for CRAN compliance and closed a timer edge case, 1.3.3 adjusted the integration with rcpptimer against its now-stable 1.2.0 API. The last release to change what users can do was 1.3.0, which exposed the conline C++ class to R and exported init_experts_list(), make_basis_mats(), make_hat_mats() and post_process_model() so the engine can be driven directly.
◆ Where it's heading
The direction is toward a reusable C++ core with thin language bindings. The timing code that lived inside profoc was extracted into the standalone rcpptimer package in 1.3.2, deliberately so other R packages and Python projects could use it through cpptimer and cppytimer, and the clock header was reworked in 1.3.1 to maximise the code shared between the R and Python versions. Method work sits earlier in the history - periodic splines and penalties in 1.2.0, the penalty() function in 1.1.0 - while the recent cadence, a single release in the last sixteen months, points at a package the maintainer considers finished.
◆ Prediction
The repeated references to future Python use suggest the next significant work happens outside this package, in the shared C++ components, rather than in profoc's R surface.
Alternatives to ipaddress and profoc
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 ipaddress or profoc.
bsvarSIGNs
Sign, zero and narrative restrictions brought into the bsvars ecosystem.
estimatr
Fast design-based estimators for experiments, coasting on CRAN patches.
ggdist
The grammar of uncertainty visualization, now drawing the uncertainty in its own estimates.
ltertools
A column-key toolkit for stitching decades of ecological field data into one table.
finnts
Microsoft's automated forecasting framework, still mostly a one-maintainer effort.
See all ipaddress alternatives → · See all profoc alternatives →
Recent activity from ipaddress and profoc
Latest ship moves from both products, interleaved chronologically. ⚡ = editorial spark.
- 6mo agoprofocCRAN compliance fix removing a namespace directive
- 0y agoipaddresstestthat deprecation warnings resolved
- 1y agoprofocTimer integration updated to the stable rcpptimer API
- 2y agoprofocTiming code extracted into the standalone rcpptimer package
- 2y agoprofocInteger overflow fix and Welford timing statistics
- 2y agoprofocThe conline C++ class opens up to R users
- 2y agoprofocQuantile crossing flagged and tidy methods added
- 3y agoipaddress1.0.0 breaks the interface to make it vector-native ⚡
- 3y agoipaddressDeprecated C++ sprintf calls replaced
- 4y agoipaddressroxygen upgrade to clear HTML5 check notes
- 4y agoipaddressWindows compiler toolchain compatibility for R 4.2
- 5y agoipaddressHotfix for CRAN check warnings
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between ipaddress and profoc?
Both compete on the same themes — rcpp, r-package — within Infra & APIs. ipaddress and profoc 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 ipaddress better than profoc?
Sparkpulse doesn't pick a winner — we score release velocity, not feature parity. ipaddress and profoc 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 ipaddress?
Top ipaddress alternatives in Infra & APIs are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "ipaddress alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/ipaddress for the full list with editorial commentary on each.
What are the best alternatives to profoc?
Top profoc alternatives in Infra & APIs are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "profoc alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/profoc for the full list with editorial commentary on each.