R Observatory: Metrics for flexstanr version 0.2.0

Balamuta, James Joseph

doi:10.5281/zenodo.21843040

flexstanr

0.2.0Package record

Portable Backend Layer for 'Stan' Models

2packages depend

962downloads / year

83.3%test coverage

13/13flavors OK

Overview

About

Maintained by Carl PearsonCRAN page ↗GitHub ↗Website ↗Issues ↗

Gives a 'Stan'-based R package one interface for fitting its models through either 'rstan' or 'cmdstanr', neither of which is required to install this package (install whichever you use). Collects and validates sampler options, guarding against mixing one backend's argument vocabulary into the other, dispatches the fit to the chosen backend, and exposes backend-agnostic accessors for reading posterior draws, extracting parameters, and running generated quantities. The host package supplies its own compiled models; flexstanr resolves them from the calling package at run time, so the same code works whichever backend is installed.

Changes in 0.2.0

backend_extract() now states its return shape as a contract rather than leaving it to the backend (#34). pars defaults to NULL, which extracts every parameter, and a new format argument picks the representation: "list" (the default) is rstan::extract()-compatible, "draws" returns a posterior draws array with the chain structure intact, and "matrix" returns a plain draws x variables matrix -- the shape backend_generate_quantities() takes as draws_mat. Each format has the same shape whichever backend produced the fit, so downstream code no longer has to branch on the backend. Existing calls are unaffected: format defaults to the shape backend_extract() already returned.
Bug fix: the cmdstanr backend returned a scalar parameter as a dimensionless vector, while rstan::extract() returns a 1-D array of length S for a scalar in every call form. Code that reshapes off dim() (aperm() errors outright on a dimensionless vector) therefore behaved differently depending on which backend produced the fit. The cmdstanr path now matches rstan. A vector[1] is still kept as an S x 1 matrix on both backends, as rstan does.

Show all changes in 0.2.0Hide the rest of the changes in 0.2.0

stan_options(threading = TRUE) turns on scheduler-aware threading (ported from hestia): flexstanr splits the cores the process is allowed to use -- detected with parallelly::availableCores(), respecting HPC schedulers and cgroup quotas -- between chain-parallelism and within-chain (reduce_sum) threads, using all available cores by default (cap with max_cores), and reports what it chose. fit_model() applies the split per backend, compiling the cmdstanr model with threading enabled when needed. The new exported test_threaded() lets a host package's fit function warn when its model cannot use the offered threads. See the new "Parallel and threaded fitting" vignette.
rstan and cmdstanr are now equally optional backends. rstan moved from Imports to Suggests, so flexstanr installs and loads without either package; selecting a backend whose package is not installed fails with an actionable error, and an attach-time message points the way when neither is present. Install whichever backend you use (#30).
use_flexstanr() now generates the host package's re-export file (with a do-not-edit banner) in addition to editing its DESCRIPTION, and its signature mirrors usethis::use_package() (min_version, remote). It wires in flexstanr only; pick and declare a backend (rstan or cmdstanr) yourself.

From NEWS.md in the release

Install

R (CRAN)pak (dev)Ubuntu (r2u)Fedora (COPR)openSUSE (OBS)

install.packages("flexstanr", repos = "https://cloud.r-project.org/")

Installs the current CRAN release. Prebuilt binaries on Windows and macOS.

if (!requireNamespace("pak", quietly = TRUE))
  install.packages("pak", repos = "https://cloud.r-project.org/")
pak::pak("ACCIDDA/flexstanr")

Development version from ACCIDDA/flexstanr. Installs pak first if it is not already available.

Release

# enable cranapt (r2u) if it is not already set up, then install
grep -rqs r2u.stat.illinois.edu /etc/apt/sources.list /etc/apt/sources.list.d/ \
  || curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/eddelbuettel/r2u/master/inst/scripts/add_cranapt_noble.sh | sudo bash
sudo apt install -y r-cran-flexstanr

Fast Ubuntu binaries via r2u (no compilation). The cranapt setup runs once and is skipped when it is already enabled. We list this channel from recorded r2u download activity rather than from a live index of the repository, so treat it as last known rather than guaranteed.

bspm (used by r2u) also needs make: sudo apt install make

# enable the iucar/cran COPR if it is not already present, then install
ls /etc/yum.repos.d/*iucar*cran*.repo >/dev/null 2>&1 \
  || sudo dnf copr enable -y iucar/cran
sudo dnf install -y R-CRAN-flexstanr

RPMs from the iucar/cran COPR, rebuilt from CRAN.

For install.packages() integration in R, also: sudo dnf install R-CoprManager

# add the autoCRAN OBS repo (Tumbleweed) if it is missing, then install
zypper -q lr | grep -qi autoCRAN \
  || sudo zypper addrepo https://download.opensuse.org/repositories/devel:/languages:/R:/autoCRAN/openSUSE_Tumbleweed/devel:languages:R:autoCRAN.repo
sudo zypper install -y R-flexstanr

RPMs auto-built from CRAN on openSUSE OBS (Tumbleweed). We list this channel from recorded autoCRAN download activity rather than from a live index of the repository, so treat it as last known rather than guaranteed.

Health

CRAN checks

13OK

CRAN check page ↗

Slowest check: 2.2 min · r-oldrel-windows-x86_64

Status changes

OK13 OK2026-08-05
NOTE12 OK, 1 NOTE2026-08-01
OK7 OK2026-07-18

Advisories

none known

How this is measured·How advisories are found

Documentation

In release 0.2.0

READMEYes · 734 wordsVignettesYes · 2 · evaluation depends on the environmentNEWSYes · 100% structured · mentions 0.2.0Citation fileNoWebsiteYes · pkgdown

Help pages: 33 (25 internal)includes a package overview page
Examples that run: 38%3 run in a plain check (2 of them under a condition) · 5 never run
Exported functions with examples: 100%
Documented parameters: 100%
Return-value docs: 100%
Help pages citing references: 0%

Vignettes (2)

How these are measured

Downloads

962

CRAN downloads in the past year

Rank #13,908 · ~3/day · ~80/mo

Releases R versions

Daily download trend is not available in this view yet.

25930 days

84390 days

9621 year

Compare downloads with other packages →

Also on31 r2u3 autocran

How downloads are counted

Repository

accidda/flexstanr ↗Organization: ACCIDDA

1Stars

0Forks

4Open issues

0Open PRs

0Releases

25Commits

1Commit identities

25 commits · Last activity 2026-10-19 · 0% stars, 30d · Default branch at 0.3.0, ahead of CRAN 0.2.0 (checked 2026-10-21)

Responsiveness

How these are sampled

PRs merged (all time): 89%
Median days to close, 50 most recently updated closed issues: 1
Median days to close, 50 most recently updated closed PRs: 1

Stars over time

2026-07-18 · 02026-08-12 · 1

How these are measured

PracticesBeta

9 development-tooling and community-health practices detected across 5 families in the upstream repository

Checks run against github.com/accidda/flexstanr on 2026-10-21.

Continuous integration (2)

GitHub ActionsR CMD check workflow

The R CMD check workflow runs on Linux, macOS and Windows, and on R-devel

Docs source (3)

pkgdown

GitHub Pages site last deployed 2026-10-19 · The repository has a site deploy workflow

pkgdown site last built 2026-10-19

Coverage (1)

Coverage reporting

CRAN release process (1)

cran-comments.md

Show all practicesHide 1 practice

Lint, format, editor (2)

lintrLint workflow

How this is detected·Detection ruleset v4 (2026-10-20)

Dependencies

Declared dependencies

12 external dependencies (excludes base and recommended)

Installing flexstanr adds 1 package (1 with compiled code, 343 KB of source tarballs). Heaviest: parallelly 343 KB.

Depends (1)

R >= 4.1.0

Imports (3)

methodsparallellytools

LinkingTo (0)

none

Suggests (11)

cmdstanr desc knitr pkgload posterior rmarkdown roxygen2 rstan spelling testthat withr

Enhances (0)

none

Dependency license breakdown →

Reverse dependencies

2direct

0indirect

Imports 2

Depends, Imports or LinkingTo, most downloaded first

imuGAP hestia

How these are counted

Code & Tests

People & History

People (2)

Carl Pearson

Author, Maintainer since 0.1.0 (2026)

Weston Voglesonger

Author

Releases (2)

Pick two releases to compare their code metrics.

0.2.0Latest
record
2026-08-25 · current release · diff ↗ ·
added 1 export
test_threaded
0.1.0
record
2026-07-17
R
R 4.6.0 released · 2026-04-24

Package metadata

First published: 2026-07-17
Total releases: 2 / 1 yrs
License: MIT + file LICENSE OSI
Additional repositories: stan-dev.r-universe.dev
Minimum R: ≥ 4.1.0
Download size: 56 KB

Cite

Cite this package

Run in R for the authors' preferred citation:

citation("flexstanr")

Format

Pearson, C., & Voglesonger, W. (2026). flexstanr: Portable Backend Layer for 'Stan' Models (Version 0.2.0) [Computer software]. https://doi.org/10.32614/CRAN.package.flexstanr

This package has no citation file, so citation() returns this entry built from DESCRIPTION.

Cite the R Observatory

For a number measured here: a download total, a coverage figure, an archival date.

Format

APA

Balamuta, J. J. (2026). R Observatory: Metrics for flexstanr version 0.2.0 [Data set]. HJJB, LLC. Data release v2026-10-23. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21843040

From data release v2026-10-23, which the citation names so these numbers can be found later. More on citing and the projects behind them.

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