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I am working on an R package that builds on a postgreSQL database. Hence there are some.sql files that contain a recommended table structure for the corresponding database.

I wonder where to put these files if I want to build a package (for CRAN)?

Matt Bannert
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1 Answers1

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maybe put them in folder "inst" (top level), like inst/sql

then the user or a function of yours could access files there with 

base <- system.file('sql', package='bannertpackage')
sqls <- dir(base, "*sql", f=TRUE)

and execute them

http://cran.r-project.org/doc/manuals/R-exts.html#Package-subdirectories

The contents of the inst subdirectory will be copied recursively to the installation directory. Subdirectories of inst should not interfere with those used by R (currently, R, data, demo, exec, libs, man, help, html and Meta, and earlier versions used latex, R-ex). The copying of the inst happens after src is built so its Makefile can create files to be installed.

There will be a top folder in the library folder called sql which is nice, and you can access it from R, which is what you need.

Ido Tamir
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  • Thx! could you explain why you feel inst is the right place? Btw: I use devtools / R Studio to build the package. – Matt Bannert Aug 23 '13 at 10:24
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    @MattBannert `inst` is the right place because it's installed with your package. – hadley Aug 23 '13 at 12:42
  • what if my .sql files are simply querying data, which I pass into, say, `RODBC::sqlQuery()` to create a `data.frame`? Should I just create a sql/ directory in that case or what? – Brash Equilibrium Sep 03 '14 at 00:57
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    Whenever you need to make files accessible from R put them somewhere under inst. – Ido Tamir Sep 03 '14 at 04:24
  • `qry <- paste(readLines('inst/sql/my_query.sql'), collapse = " ")` works just like I had hoped – Jubbles Jan 02 '16 at 23:27
  • I am facing a similar problem, but for xlsx files. Could someone please explain how are we accessing these files? – Siddd Jun 19 '18 at 20:10