Registering
In order to use RStudio Connect as a board, you need to authenticate first. When using RStudio, you can authenticate launching Tools - Global Options - Publishing - Connect, and follow the instructions from that wizard:
Once an RStudio Connect account is registered in RStudio, you can simply run:
Notice that board_register_rsconnect() is just an alias with named parameters to board_register(); the previous code is equivalent to:
If you happen to have multiple RStudio Connect servers registered, you will have to specify the server parameter. Similarly, when multiple accounts are registered, you will need to specify the account parameter.
Once the RStudio Connect board is registered, you can pin and search using pin(), pin_get() and pin_find() as usual.
Pinning
Like in other boards, you can create pins for iris and mtcars by setting board to the RStudio Connect board,
After a pin is created, the pin also becomes available in RStudio Connect,
You can also retrieve pins back from RStudio Connect using the now familiar pin_get() function.
# A tibble: 150 x 5
Sepal.Length Sepal.Width Petal.Length Petal.Width Species
<dbl> <dbl> <dbl> <dbl> <fct>
1 5.1 3.5 1.4 0.2 setosa
2 4.9 3 1.4 0.2 setosa
3 4.7 3.2 1.3 0.2 setosa
4 4.6 3.1 1.5 0.2 setosa
5 5 3.6 1.4 0.2 setosa
6 5.4 3.9 1.7 0.4 setosa
7 4.6 3.4 1.4 0.3 setosa
8 5 3.4 1.5 0.2 setosa
9 4.4 2.9 1.4 0.2 setosa
10 4.9 3.1 1.5 0.1 setosa
# … with 140 more rows
Discovering
You can then search pins in your RStudio Connect server using pin_find(), which by default search all boards but you can also explicitly request to use this particular RStudio Connect board:
# A tibble: 1 x 4
name description type board
<chr> <chr> <chr> <chr>
1 jluraschi/mtcars "The motor trend cars data set. " table rsconnect
RStudio Connect boards contain extended fields that go beyond the fields pins requires, to retrieve all the additional fields use extended = TRUE:
# A tibble: 2 x 38
id guid access_type connection_time… read_timeout init_timeout idle_timeout max_processes
<int> <chr> <chr> <lgl> <lgl> <lgl> <lgl> <lgl>
1 6446 1b9f… all NA NA NA NA NA
2 6612 bf5d… acl NA NA NA NA NA
# … with 30 more variables: min_processes <lgl>, max_conns_per_process <lgl>, load_factor <lgl>,
# url <chr>, vanity_url <lgl>, name <chr>, title <lgl>, bundle_id <int>, app_mode <int>,
# content_category <chr>, has_parameters <lgl>, created_time <chr>, last_deployed_time <chr>,
# r_version <lgl>, py_version <lgl>, build_status <int>, run_as <lgl>,
# run_as_current_user <lgl>, description <chr>, app_role <chr>, owner_first_name <chr>,
# owner_last_name <chr>, owner_username <chr>, owner_guid <chr>, owner_email <lgl>,
# owner_locked <lgl>, is_scheduled <lgl>, git <lgl>, board <chr>, type <chr>
Or pin_info() to retrieve all the information associated with a particular pin,
# Source: rsconnect<jluraschi/mtcars> [table]
# Extended:
# - id: 5639
# - guid: 9b6ae382-ebec-45de-8546-ee779e33ed10
# - access_type: acl
# - url: https://beta.rstudioconnect.com/content/5639/
# - vanity_url: FALSE
# - bundle_id: 13400
# - app_mode: 4
# - content_category: pin
# - has_parameters: FALSE
# - created_time: 2019-08-21T02:22:56.546011Z
# - last_deployed_time: 2019-08-23T15:55:25.435595Z
# - build_status: 2
# - run_as_current_user: FALSE
# - owner_first_name: Javier
# - owner_last_name: Luraschi
# - owner_username: jluraschi
# - owner_guid: ac498f34-174c-408f-8089-a9f10c630a37
# - owner_locked: FALSE
# - is_scheduled: FALSE
# - rows: 14
# - cols: 11
Notice that the given ‘mt’ search keyword is searched as a prefix in the pin name.
Sharing
You can share pins with others in RStudio Connect, by changing the viewers of the document to specific groups or all users with access; or alternatively, to specific users. This is accomplished by opening the new published pin and then changing access under the settings tab.
Once you share this pin with specific users, they can follow the same steps to register their RStudio Connect board, to download this pin.
Public
You can also choose to share a pin publicly and avoid having to register the RStudio Connect board to retrieve this pin.
To create a public pin, first publish a pin and navigate to RStudio Connect; then set the “Access” to “Anyone - no login required” – The pin will become public and accessible to anyone using their content URL. The remote resource stored in RStudio Connect can then be cached locally with pin() as follows:
To avoid having to manually change the “Access” manually, you can also set the access_type to acl, loggend_in or all when creating a pin:
Automation
One significant advantage from using RStudio Connect over other boards is its ability to schedule R Markdown reports to run automatically. This allows you to automate the creation of pins and also consume pins published manually from automated reports.
To support automation you need to use an RStudio Connect API Key as your authentication method. Therefore, the first step is to create an API Key, once created, you will need to register the board as follows:
However, since it’s a best practice to not store secrets in plain text, pins will also read the key from the CONNECT_API_KEY environment variable, or you can retrieve explicitly as Sys.getenv("CONNECT_API_KEY") before assigning it to the key parameter.
Once authenticated, you can use pins as you would normally would. Let’s take a look at an automated R Markdown report which retrieves the latest news from the BBC which we can then schedule to run daily to update the pin: