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Comparison · Analytics
mlr3proba vs readxl
A side-by-side editorial comparison of mlr3proba and readxl — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.
mlr3proba vs readxl: at a glance
What is mlr3proba?
mlr3proba is shedding weight as its survival work moves into sibling packages
mlr3proba provides probabilistic supervised learning for mlr3 — survival analysis, density estimation, and the measures that go with them. Recent releases are almost entirely upkeep: a distr6 fork to work around an upstream problem, an ooplah fix, a predict-type correction, and registration in mlr_reflections$loaded_packages. The one deletion is telling, with LearnerDensPenalized removed after pendensity left CRAN.
What is readxl?
readxl has shipped almost nothing but vendored-dependency upkeep since 2022.
readxl reads Excel files into R without requiring Excel, bundling the libxls and RapidXML C libraries. Four of its last six releases state outright that they contain no user-facing changes, existing instead to satisfy CRAN, silence a sanitizer warning, or re-embed a patched libxls.
mlr3proba vs readxl: editorial side-by-side
mlr3proba
0.0ANALYTICS
mlr3proba is shedding weight as its survival work moves into sibling packages
◆ Current state
mlr3proba provides probabilistic supervised learning for mlr3 — survival analysis, density estimation, and the measures that go with them. Recent releases are almost entirely upkeep: a distr6 fork to work around an upstream problem, an ooplah fix, a predict-type correction, and registration in mlr_reflections$loaded_packages. The one deletion is telling, with LearnerDensPenalized removed after pendensity left CRAN.
◆ Where it's heading
The package is being pared back rather than extended. Its README now points at survdistr and mlr3cmprsk as matured alternatives for parts of what it covers, which reads as scope being handed off, while the Cox proportional-hazards autoplot arrived from mlr3viz in the other direction. Several fixes exist to route around dependencies that broke or disappeared, which is the recurring cost of building on a long chain of specialized CRAN packages.
◆ Prediction
The dependency churn suggests more consolidation — further reliance on survdistr and mlr3cmprsk, and more learners retired when the package underneath them goes unmaintained.
readxl
0.0ANALYTICS
readxl has shipped almost nothing but vendored-dependency upkeep since 2022.
◆ Current state
readxl reads Excel files into R without requiring Excel, bundling the libxls and RapidXML C libraries. Four of its last six releases state outright that they contain no user-facing changes, existing instead to satisfy CRAN, silence a sanitizer warning, or re-embed a patched libxls.
◆ Where it's heading
The real work has become stewardship of vendored C code: absorbing libxls security fixes and keeping the package compiling across Alpine, UBSAN and successive cpp11 versions. 1.5.0 breaks the streak only slightly, with a network-drive permission warning fix and a cpp11 floor raised to dodge a segfault.
◆ Prediction
Expect the same rhythm — releases triggered by toolchain breakage or an upstream libxls patch rather than new spreadsheet-reading capability.
Alternatives to mlr3proba and readxl
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 mlr3proba or readxl.
writexl
writexl spent nine years refusing to do formatting, then shipped all of it in 2.0.0.
rgbif
rgbif is steadily pushing users off paged searching and onto real downloads.
rstanarm
rstanarm is community-maintained now, tracking Stan and lme4 rather than adding models.
taxa
taxa started a ground-up rewrite in 2021 and has published almost nothing since.
rotl
rotl's whole release history is keeping name matching honest against a moving taxonomy.
See all mlr3proba alternatives → · See all readxl alternatives →
Recent activity from mlr3proba and readxl
Latest ship moves from both products, interleaved chronologically. ⚡ = editorial spark.
- 2mo agomlr3probamlr3proba 0.8.10 registers itself in the mlr3 loaded-packages registry
- 2mo agoreadxlreadxl 1.5.0 stops false access-denied warnings on network drives
- 4mo agomlr3probamlr3proba 0.8.9 drops LearnerDensPenalized after pendensity left CRAN
- 5mo agomlr3probamlr3proba 0.8.8
- 5mo agomlr3probamlr3proba 0.8.7
- 9mo agomlr3probamlr3proba 0.8.5
- 10mo agomlr3probamlr3proba 0.8.4 takes over the Cox proportional-hazards autoplot
- 1y agoreadxlreadxl 1.4.5 clears a gcc UBSAN warning
- 1y agoreadxlreadxl 1.4.4 embeds libxls 1.6.3 with vulnerability fixes
- 3y agoreadxlreadxl 1.4.3 ships with no user-facing changes
- 3y agoreadxlreadxl 1.4.2 embeds a libxls build fixing CVE-2021-27836
- 3y agoreadxlreadxl 1.4.1 regenerates help files for valid HTML5
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between mlr3proba and readxl?
They serve adjacent needs but don't currently overlap on shipped themes. mlr3proba and readxl 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 mlr3proba better than readxl?
Sparkpulse doesn't pick a winner — we score release velocity, not feature parity. mlr3proba and readxl 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 mlr3proba?
Top mlr3proba alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "mlr3proba alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/mlr3proba for the full list with editorial commentary on each.
What are the best alternatives to readxl?
Top readxl alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "readxl alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/readxl for the full list with editorial commentary on each.