To obtain help for an object with a non-standard name (such as the help operator ?), the name must be quoted: for example, help('?') or ?'?'. ), and must begin with a letter or a period. Standard names in R consist of upper- and lower-case letters, numerals ( 0-9), underscores ( _), and periods (. To access help for a function in a package that’s not currently loaded, specify in addition the name of the package: For example, to obtain documentation for the rlm() (robust linear model) function in the MASS package, help(rlm, package='MASS').

To access documentation for the standard lm (linear model) function, for example, enter the command help(lm) or help('lm'), or ?lm or ?'lm' (i.e., the quotes are optional). The help() function and ? help operator in R provide access to the documentation pages for R functions, data sets, and other objects, both for packages in the standard R distribution and for contributed packages. There are also specialized search engines for accessing information about R on the internet, and general internet search engines can also prove useful ( see below). R includes extensive facilities for accessing documentation and searching for help. Before asking others for help, it’s generally a good idea for you to try to help yourself.

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