One big plus of R’s default package index, CRAN, is that they screen all published packages to ensure they work together at any given point in time. It puts some extra stress on package devs but makes reproducibility a lot easier for package users.
R-universe.dev does CI/CD package builds as personal indexes. R-multiverse.dev brings all the R-universes into one index from what I understand.
Jul 23, 2025 04:20The “community” multiverse channel is more of a free for all, but its “production” channel aims to keep the CRAN dependency standards. This might address your “why do I need to install a package to install other packages?” question, and I think they have potential to be a future default!
(That being said, usually I run a dev container and have renv or pak install from a lock file anyway!)
