Online Documentation

Usage

help(topic, package = c(.packages(),.Autoloaded), lib.loc = .lib.loc)

?topic

Arguments

topic a name or character string on which documentation is sought (but not a variable containing a character string!).
package a name or character vector giving the packages to look into for documentation. By default, all packages in the search path are used.
lib.loc A character vector of directory names of R libraries. Defaults to all libraries currently known.

Description

These functions provide online access to documentation. Documentation on a topic with name name (typically, an R object or a data set) can be printed on-screen with either help(name) or ?name. In the case of unary and binary operators and control-flow special forms, the name may need to be be quoted.

See Also

help.start() which opens the HTML version of the R Manual; library for listing available packages and the user-level objects they contain; data for listing available data sets; methods.

See prompt to get a prototype for writing help pages of private packages.

Examples

help()
help(help)		# the same

help(lapply)
?lapply			# the same

help("for")		# or ?"for", but the quotes are needed
?"+"

help(package = stepfun)	# get help even when it's not present

data()			# list all available data sets
?women			# information about data set "women"

topi <- "women"
help(topi) ##--> Error: No documentation for `topi'


[Package Contents]