STACAS
Single-cell batch correction that learned to use cell labels, then spent three releases chasing Seurat.
Comparison · Analytics
nswgeo vs roclang
A side-by-side editorial comparison of nswgeo and roclang — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.
nswgeo vs roclang: at a glance
What is nswgeo?
NSW boundary data for R, refreshed as the official sources move
nswgeo packages New South Wales geographic boundaries for R — suburbs, postcodes, local government areas, Primary Health Networks and Local Health Districts — as ready-to-plot sf datasets. The 0.6.0 release refreshes nearly all of them against new upstream sources, moving postcodes to 2021 ABS boundaries and taking LHD boundaries from a new official feed. It is maintained by cidm-ph alongside the mapping packages that consume it, including ggmapinset.
What is roclang?
A roxygen2 documentation-reuse helper whose release notes are mostly upstream damage control.
roclang lets package authors pull documentation text out of an existing function's roxygen block and splice it into their own — extract_roc_text() with type = "param", "dot_params" or a section selector. The feature surface has been stable since 0.2.1; the parameter-matching rules and the checks for invalid or ambiguous extractions are the substance of what shipped.
nswgeo vs roclang: editorial side-by-side
nswgeo
0.0ANALYTICS
NSW boundary data for R, refreshed as the official sources move
◆ Current state
nswgeo packages New South Wales geographic boundaries for R — suburbs, postcodes, local government areas, Primary Health Networks and Local Health Districts — as ready-to-plot sf datasets. The 0.6.0 release refreshes nearly all of them against new upstream sources, moving postcodes to 2021 ABS boundaries and taking LHD boundaries from a new official feed. It is maintained by cidm-ph alongside the mapping packages that consume it, including ggmapinset.
◆ Where it's heading
Every release is dictated by an upstream release calendar rather than a roadmap: the 2023 ASGS, then 2024, then the 2021 ABS postcode boundaries and the new LHD source. That makes field-name churn the package's defining hazard — LGA_NAME_2021 to LGA_NAME_2023 to LGA_NAME_2024, and now lhd_name carrying a Local Health District suffix. The maintainer's habit of registering compatibility aliases through cartographer shows an awareness that these renames break downstream code silently.
◆ Prediction
Expect the next release to track the following ASGS edition with another round of field renames, and any new content to stay in the health-geography area the package's users work in.
roclang
0.0ANALYTICS
A roxygen2 documentation-reuse helper whose release notes are mostly upstream damage control.
◆ Current state
roclang lets package authors pull documentation text out of an existing function's roxygen block and splice it into their own — extract_roc_text() with type = "param", "dot_params" or a section selector. The feature surface has been stable since 0.2.1; the parameter-matching rules and the checks for invalid or ambiguous extractions are the substance of what shipped.
◆ Where it's heading
Nearly every release since 0.2.0 has been reactive. The package parses documentation text produced by other packages, so a wording change in stats::lm()'s documentation breaks its test suite, and a roxygen2 selection-semantics change forces its parameter matching to follow. The 0.2.3 release is exactly this pattern again. Release cadence has slowed to roughly one entry every two years, and the last two carried no functional change at all.
◆ Prediction
Further releases are most likely triggered by upstream roxygen2 or base R documentation edits breaking tests rather than by new extraction capability. The entries show no queued feature work.
Alternatives to nswgeo and roclang
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 nswgeo or roclang.
ggtrace
A debugger for ggplot2's internals, hardening its grip as the internals it traces keep moving.
kde1d
A univariate density estimator that added zero-inflated data and reopened its C++ API to do it.
svines
Stationary vine copulas for time series, released in lockstep with the rest of Nagler's vine stack.
gghighlight
A single-purpose ggplot2 extension that has spent six years tracking ggplot2 instead of growing.
rtrek
A Star Trek data package that became a Memory Alpha web client and has been patching scrapers ever since.
See all nswgeo alternatives → · See all roclang alternatives →
Recent activity from nswgeo and roclang
Latest ship moves from both products, interleaved chronologically. ⚡ = editorial spark.
- 4mo agonswgeoSuburb, postcode, PHN and LHD boundaries all refreshed
- 6mo agonswgeonswgeo 0.5.1
- 11mo agoroclangTest fix for changed stats::lm() Reference section
- 1y agonswgeoUpdated to the 2024 ASGS release
- 2y agonswgeoTerritories, PHN maps and the outline() helper added
- 3y agoroclangREADME loading switched to pkgload, downloads badge added
- 3y agoroclangDot-params error messages and ... selection unblocked
- 4y agoroclangMulti-parameter selection follows roxygen2 7.1.2 semantics
- 4y agoroclangAmbiguous unqualified function names now error
- 4y agoroclangCI workflows, fuller test coverage, unqualified-package fix
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between nswgeo and roclang?
They serve adjacent needs but don't currently overlap on shipped themes. nswgeo and roclang 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 nswgeo better than roclang?
Sparkpulse doesn't pick a winner — we score release velocity, not feature parity. nswgeo and roclang 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 nswgeo?
Top nswgeo alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "nswgeo alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/nswgeo for the full list with editorial commentary on each.
What are the best alternatives to roclang?
Top roclang alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "roclang alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/roclang for the full list with editorial commentary on each.