Tplyr
Tplyr made clinical summary tables explain where every number came from.
A side-by-side editorial comparison of slider and tidytlg — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.
Feature-complete since 2021, and every release since has been paying CRAN's C API bill
slider provides sliding-window and index-aware window functions for R, with a C implementation underneath and a specialised fast path for common aggregations. The user-facing surface has been stable since 0.3.0 in late 2022. Everything after that is compliance and platform work: STRING_PTR removed in 0.3.2, OBJECT() removed in 0.3.3, a vctrs callable's C signature corrected, and the minimum R version raised twice.
A tables-listings-graphs package that reached CRAN and then went quiet.
tidytlg generates clinical tables, listings, and graphs from tidyverse-style pipelines, maintained under the pharmaverse organisation. All four releases in the window are from a single eight-month stretch in 2023, and their content is CRAN preparation, a logging-dependency swap, and multi-file support. Release notes are merge lists rather than described changes.
slider provides sliding-window and index-aware window functions for R, with a C implementation underneath and a specialised fast path for common aggregations. The user-facing surface has been stable since 0.3.0 in late 2022. Everything after that is compliance and platform work: STRING_PTR removed in 0.3.2, OBJECT() removed in 0.3.3, a vctrs callable's C signature corrected, and the minimum R version raised twice.
Two forces set the release schedule, and neither is feature demand. The first is CRAN closing off non-API C entry points, which packages reaching into R internals for speed have to unwind one accessor at a time — slider is on its second such release with no visible loss of function. The second is vctrs, whose breaking changes slider absorbs ahead of time; 0.2.2 exists solely to prepare for one. The last release that added anything callers can see was 0.3.0's slider_plus() and slider_minus() extension hooks.
Expect the pattern to continue: another non-API accessor removal or a vctrs compatibility release, rather than new window functions. The C-level surface is the only part of this package still moving.
tidytlg generates clinical tables, listings, and graphs from tidyverse-style pipelines, maintained under the pharmaverse organisation. All four releases in the window are from a single eight-month stretch in 2023, and their content is CRAN preparation, a logging-dependency swap, and multi-file support. Release notes are merge lists rather than described changes.
The visible arc is getting onto CRAN and staying installable — vignette corrections per CRAN comments, a badge, a check fix, and replacing the timber logging package with logrx. The one functional addition is multiple-file support. There has been no release since October 2023, so on this evidence the package is stable or dormant rather than actively developing.
The entries give no signal about planned work; with nothing shipped in roughly two years, the more likely next event is a maintenance release triggered by a dependency or CRAN check than a feature.
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 slider or tidytlg.
Tplyr made clinical summary tables explain where every number came from.
Clinical listings that keep inheriting their hardest problem — pagination — from the layer below.
A cache-directory helper that has shipped nothing but CRAN-triggered patches for seven years.
gigs redesigned its whole conversion API for rOpenSci, then spent three releases getting the docs to build.
A weather-data client that keeps rewriting its HTTP layer while slowly tightening its API.
datasetjson rebuilt its object model to track the CDISC Dataset-JSON 1.1 schema.
See all slider alternatives → · See all tidytlg alternatives →
Latest ship moves from both products, interleaved chronologically. ⚡ = editorial spark.
Both compete on the same themes — maintenance — within Analytics. slider and tidytlg 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.
Sparkpulse doesn't pick a winner — we score release velocity, not feature parity. slider and tidytlg 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.
Top slider alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "slider alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/slider for the full list with editorial commentary on each.
Top tidytlg alternatives in Analytics are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "tidytlg alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/tidytlg for the full list with editorial commentary on each.