Create Details HTML Tag for Markdown and Package Documentation.
details 
Suppose you’re opening an issue in GitHub and there’s a lot noisey logs that may be useful or you want to add the sessionInfo() to the end of the issue.
Rather than wrecking readability, wrapping it in a <details> tag is a great solution
<details>
<summary>Summary Goes Here</summary>
...this is hidden, collapsable content...
</details>
Doing this manually every time is a pain.
details is a package lets you create and customize details blocks for markdown documents and Roxygen2 documentation within R.
Installation
CRAN
install.packages("details")
Dev
remotes::install_github("yonicd/details")
Markdown
Input
The function details::details can handle inputs
- R object with supported classes:
characterdata.frametibblelistdevice(eg plots)
- File paths will be identified internally and the lines will be read in automatically.
Output
The function details::details can output the result to
- console (default)
- clipboard via clipr
- file.editor useful when clipr not available
Examples
One the most popular uses for details is to paste the sessioninfo at the bottom of a GitHub issue.
library(details)
sessioninfo::session_info()|>
details::details(summary = 'current session info')
current session info
─ Session info ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
setting value
version R version 4.3.2 (2023-10-31 ucrt)
os Windows 11 x64 (build 22631)
system x86_64, mingw32
ui RTerm
language (EN)
collate English_United States.utf8
ctype English_United States.utf8
tz America/New_York
date 2025-02-01
pandoc 3.6.2 @ C:/PROGRA~3/CHOCOL~1/bin/ (via rmarkdown)
─ Packages ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
package * version date (UTC) lib source
cli 3.6.1 2023-03-23 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
clipr 0.8.0 2022-02-22 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
desc 1.4.2 2022-09-08 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
details * 0.4.0 2025-02-01 [1] local
digest 0.6.33 2023-07-07 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
evaluate 1.0.3 2025-01-10 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.3)
fastmap 1.1.1 2023-02-24 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
htmltools 0.5.7 2023-11-03 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
httr 1.4.7 2023-08-15 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
knitr 1.45 2023-10-30 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
png 0.1-8 2022-11-29 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.1)
R6 2.5.1 2021-08-19 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
rlang 1.1.2 2023-11-04 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
rmarkdown 2.29 2024-11-04 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.3)
rprojroot 2.0.4 2023-11-05 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
rstudioapi 0.15.0 2023-07-07 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
sessioninfo 1.2.2 2021-12-06 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.3)
withr 3.0.2 2024-10-28 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.3)
xfun 0.50 2025-01-07 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.3)
yaml 2.3.7 2023-01-23 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
[1] C:/Users/yoni/AppData/Local/R/win-library/4.3
[2] C:/Program Files/R/R-4.3.2/library
──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
You can also use the knitr chunk engine that is shipped with details to created outputs in Rmarkdown documents.
```{details, echo = FALSE, details.summary = 'current session info'}
sessioninfo::session_info()
```
current session info
─ Session info ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
setting value
version R version 4.3.2 (2023-10-31 ucrt)
os Windows 11 x64 (build 22631)
system x86_64, mingw32
ui RTerm
language (EN)
collate English_United States.utf8
ctype English_United States.utf8
tz America/New_York
date 2025-02-01
pandoc 3.6.2 @ C:/PROGRA~3/CHOCOL~1/bin/ (via rmarkdown)
─ Packages ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
package * version date (UTC) lib source
cli 3.6.1 2023-03-23 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
clipr 0.8.0 2022-02-22 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
desc 1.4.2 2022-09-08 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
details * 0.4.0 2025-02-01 [1] local
digest 0.6.33 2023-07-07 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
evaluate 1.0.3 2025-01-10 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.3)
fastmap 1.1.1 2023-02-24 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
htmltools 0.5.7 2023-11-03 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
httr 1.4.7 2023-08-15 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
knitr 1.45 2023-10-30 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
png 0.1-8 2022-11-29 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.1)
R6 2.5.1 2021-08-19 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
rlang 1.1.2 2023-11-04 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
rmarkdown 2.29 2024-11-04 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.3)
rprojroot 2.0.4 2023-11-05 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
rstudioapi 0.15.0 2023-07-07 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
sessioninfo 1.2.2 2021-12-06 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.3)
withr 3.0.2 2024-10-28 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.3)
xfun 0.50 2025-01-07 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.3)
yaml 2.3.7 2023-01-23 [1] CRAN (R 4.3.2)
[1] C:/Users/yoni/AppData/Local/R/win-library/4.3
[2] C:/Program Files/R/R-4.3.2/library
──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
There are a number of objects that can be placed in a details block other than a character object. An example of a object is a device output such as a plot
details(plot(x=mtcars$mpg,y=mtcars$wt), summary = 'My plot',imgur = interactive())
My Plot
Package Documentation
Many times in documentation there is a lot to say, but you do not want to overwhelm the user.
To solve this we can use folding blocks in the documentation (which are then rendered into pkgdown website automatically)
Setup
To make it easy to set up the DESCRIPTION file of your package so you can use details macros run the following :
use_details('PATH_TO_DESCRIPTION_FILE')
This will append three elements to the DESCRIPTION file
- Imports: details
- RdMacros: details
- Roxygen: list(markdown = TRUE)
Usage
You can use this feature by wrapping documentation with the macros
\foldstart{[SUMMARY TEXT]}
#' DOCUMENTATION
#' ...
#' DOCUMENTATION
\foldend
The SUMMARY_TEXT is optional, where the folded block will have a header of SUMMARY TEXT.
The default will display details.
These folded blocks can be inserted anywhere in the documentation, eg @description, @param, @details, @return, ….
Vignettes
More information can be found in the articles of the package site.
- Creating a sessioninfo to paste into Github, Stackoverflow or Community Sites.
- Customizing the details output
- What R objects details can handle
- Using the details knitr chunk engine
- Using details in Roxygen2
Code of Conduct
Please note that the ‘details’ project is released with a Contributor Code of Conduct. By contributing to this project, you agree to abide by its terms.