Real

Integrative statistics with R.

Real is an integrative approach to statistical computing in logic programming.
It allows the seamless integration of R code with modern Prolog systems.
The primary reference for Real is the 2016 Journal of Approximate Reasoning paper.

Real works on current versions of SWI and Yap. It uses R's C interface to efficiently
exchange data between Prolog and the R executable which is ran as an OS shared library.

The code has be developed on linux and binaries are also included for MS Windows.
Provisio of a gcc in the path, it should also compile on Mac OS.

install

SWI

Real can be installed from within SWI using its package manager.
Real requires R to be available as a runtime library in your system.

?- pack_install(real).

And then load by :

?- [library(real)].

If you working on *nix like systems with gcc installed, you are adviced to rebuild from sources, by running

?- pack_rebuild(real).

To install a source distribution:

?- pack_install( 'the_source.tgz' ).

To install from git, replace the pack installed prolog/real.pl and c/real.c. Then:

?- pack_rebuild( real ).

As of Real v1.4, Real takes advantage of the syntactic innovations introduced in
SWI v7 (see also SWI-7 extensions paper).

Yap

Yap binaries include real (libary(real)), although these are likely to be older versions.

Yap sources include real as a package. Include it in the built by using:

../configure --with-R

To build the release or git sources, replace packages/real with the desired version and build with the configure shown above.

examples

There is a raft of examples in the file examples/for_real.pl which also implements a run all script (for_real).

?- [pack(real/examples/for_real)].

?- edit( pack(real/examples/for_real) ).

?- for_real.

docs

The following resources are available:

IJAR 2016 paper: Real v2.0
users' guide: guide.pdf (also available in distribution directory doc/)
pldoc generated html: real.html
PADL 2013 paper: padl2013-real.pdf
examples, for_real.pl

sources

Sources for SWI packager: real
Sources (1.0.0, 2013/12/6, prepared for Yap): real-src-1.0.0.tgz

publications

Advances in integrative statistics for logic programming
Nicos Angelopoulos, Samer Abdallah and Georgios Giamas
International Journal of Approximate Reasoning, (IJAR)
Volume 78, November 2016, pages 103-115. [j.ijar.2016.06.008],[bib]

Integrative functional statistics in logic programming.
Nicos Angelopoulos, Vitor Costa Santos, Joao Azevedo, Jan Wielemaker, Rui Camacho and Lodewyk Wessels
In Practical Aspects of Declarative Languages (PADL'13)
January, 2013. Rome, Italy.
[padl2013-real.pdf],[bib]

contact

We always welcome comments on use cases. Particularly, applications and publications that use this pack.
We also welcome fixes and bug reports. For contact details see: contact

thanks

To Jan Wielemaker, SWI-Prolog developer, for re-writing the original C code for v.0.1. A number of improvements for v.2
To Samer Abdallah for improvements to threads and automatically setting $R_HOME.

authors

Nicos Angelopoulos
Vitor Costa Santos

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London, March 2017

Last update June 2022.