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Comparison · Analytics
rtflite vs tern.rbmi
A side-by-side editorial comparison of rtflite and tern.rbmi — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.
Shared themes:pharmaverse
rtflite vs tern.rbmi: at a glance
What is rtflite?
rtflite stopped being an RTF writer and became the conversion layer for clinical table output.
rtflite generates the RTF tables clinical study reports are built from, a Python answer to the R tooling that has owned this niche. Over one dense month it grew a full export path: DOCX in 2.2.0, DOCX concatenation in 2.3.0, a configurable LibreOffice converter in 2.4.0, and HTML plus PDF in 2.5.0. The three releases since have been documentation, test infrastructure, and typing work — the feature push has stopped and consolidation has started.
What is tern.rbmi?
Reference-based multiple imputation tables, shipping only what CRAN checks demand.
tern.rbmi renders the output of {rbmi} reference-based multiple imputation analyses into tern tables for clinical reporting. Its three most recent releases exist to satisfy CRAN: restricting vignette builds to gcc, adding V8 to Suggests, and a plain resubmission. No user-facing functionality has changed in the visible window.
rtflite vs tern.rbmi: editorial side-by-side
rtflite
0.0ANALYTICS
rtflite stopped being an RTF writer and became the conversion layer for clinical table output.
◆ Current state
rtflite generates the RTF tables clinical study reports are built from, a Python answer to the R tooling that has owned this niche. Over one dense month it grew a full export path: DOCX in 2.2.0, DOCX concatenation in 2.3.0, a configurable LibreOffice converter in 2.4.0, and HTML plus PDF in 2.5.0. The three releases since have been documentation, test infrastructure, and typing work — the feature push has stopped and consolidation has started.
◆ Where it's heading
Every format addition routes through the same LibreOffice converter rather than a per-format implementation, and 2.4.0's breaking change made that converter an injectable object you can configure and reuse. That is the shape of a package expecting to run inside a pipeline that produces hundreds of tables, not one that converts a document at a time. The recent quiet — snapshot tests moved onto `pytest-r-snapshot`, docs migrated, pandas and pyarrow dropped from dev dependencies — reads as work to stay dependency-light while the surface stabilizes.
◆ Prediction
With the export matrix filled in and three consecutive infrastructure-only releases, the next substantive change is most likely on the input side — table construction and pagination — since `page_by` and `subline_by` are the only feature area still generating bug reports in these notes.
tern.rbmi
0.0ANALYTICS
Reference-based multiple imputation tables, shipping only what CRAN checks demand.
◆ Current state
tern.rbmi renders the output of {rbmi} reference-based multiple imputation analyses into tern tables for clinical reporting. Its three most recent releases exist to satisfy CRAN: restricting vignette builds to gcc, adding V8 to Suggests, and a plain resubmission. No user-facing functionality has changed in the visible window.
◆ Where it's heading
This is a thin adapter package and behaves like one — it moves when CRAN or an upstream dependency forces it to. Between 2022 and 2024 the feed shows only version bumps, and the 2025 releases are packaging concerns rather than analysis changes.
◆ Prediction
Expect the next release to be triggered by a CRAN check failure or an {rbmi} update rather than by new tabulation features.
Alternatives to rtflite and tern.rbmi
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 rtflite or tern.rbmi.
ymlthis
ymlthis retired itself, naming Quarto as the reason it no longer needs to exist.
forestly
forestly built an interactive safety review tool, then taught it to produce submission-ready RTF.
pharmaverseadam
pharmaverseadam is the pharmaverse's test-data mirror, and it now covers neurology.
pkglite
pkglite's whole job is knowing which files in an R package are text — and it keeps getting better at guessing.
gMCPLite
gMCPLite exists to be gMCP without Java, and its releases guard that boundary rather than extend it.
See all rtflite alternatives → · See all tern.rbmi alternatives →
Recent activity from rtflite and tern.rbmi
Latest ship moves from both products, interleaved chronologically. ⚡ = editorial spark.
- 4mo agortfliteMulti-section body typing tightened; pandas dropped from dev deps
- 7mo agortfliteAPI reference renders Pydantic field metadata
- 7mo agortfliteDocumentation site migrated to Zensical
- 7mo agortfliteSnapshot tests moved to pytest-r-snapshot
- 7mo agortfliteHTML and PDF export complete the output matrix ⚡
- 7mo agortfliteLibreOffice conversion becomes an injectable converter object
- 1y agotern.rbmiVignette built only under gcc
- 1y agotern.rbmiV8 added to Suggests
- 1y agotern.rbmiCRAN resubmission with dependency and workflow updates
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between rtflite and tern.rbmi?
Both compete on the same themes — pharmaverse — within Analytics. rtflite and tern.rbmi 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 rtflite better than tern.rbmi?
Sparkpulse doesn't pick a winner — we score release velocity, not feature parity. rtflite and tern.rbmi 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 rtflite?
Top rtflite alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "rtflite alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/rtflite for the full list with editorial commentary on each.
What are the best alternatives to tern.rbmi?
Top tern.rbmi alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "tern.rbmi alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/tern-rbmi for the full list with editorial commentary on each.