Automatically load map in R from script on startup error

Question

I've been trying to get this working without any luck (I'm new to R so don't really know how to do much and have been following examples). Basically I have an R script created that will automatically load a map when run, saved as .R file:

library(maps)
library(maptools)
library(mapdata)
map('worldHires', 
       c('UK', 'Ireland', 'Isle of Man','Isle of Wight'), 
        xlim=c(-11,3), ylim=c(49,60.9))

I want this to happen automatically when I open the RGui without having to go to load script, and then select run all. I've read about editing the Rprofile.site file which I've done and I've added an entry to it:

.First <- function(){
    library(maps)
    library(maptools)
    library(mapdata)
    map('worldHires', 
        c('UK', 'Ireland', 'Isle of Man','Isle of Wight'), 
        xlim=c(-11,3), ylim=c(49,60.9))
}

However, when I start R, I think it loads the libraries but then it says:

Error in maptype(database) : could not find function "data"

and no map is produced. However it works perfectly fine when I load the script manually and then press run all.

Am I doing something wrong here? Does the .First function only load packages? What would make it work? I've also tried just using source(script location) in the first function and that gives the same error.

score 0 · Accepted Answer · answered Sep 08 '13 at 12:58

The problem you are getting is that .First scripts can only use functions in the base package, unless the packages have been explicitly loaded. So in your case, you need to load

utils for the data function.
graphics for the par function.

Putting this together gives:

.First <- function() {
    library(utils); library(graphics)

    library(maps)
    library(maptools)
    library(mapdata)
    map('worldHires', 
        c('UK', 'Ireland', 'Isle of Man','Isle of Wight'), 
        xlim=c(-11,3), ylim=c(49,60.9))
}

Automatically load map in R from script on startup error

1 Answers1