RStudio on iPad

michaelbolger · September 20, 2017, 1:44pm

It would be nice to be able to work on RStudio Server on an iPad.

Testing on an iPad Pro with external keyboard, iOS 11 and RStudio Server version 1.1.338, I can enter text in the editor window, but the arrow and modifier keys don't work (and the arrow keys also do not work in the console). Presumably, these issues are somehow Ace related, but when I tried them in the Ace demo, the modifier keys work, as do the left, right, and up (though strangely not the down) arrow keys. Is this just a case of waiting for RStudio to catch up with the relevant Ace version?

jonathan · September 20, 2017, 4:14pm

Yes, the reason the arrow keys don't work on the iPad in RStudio is because they don't work in the version of Ace we use, and we're hoping to pick up a new Ace version so we can get proper support.

This is on our roadmap but won't happen in the next few months as new Ace versions take some time to integrate and test. Appreciate the ping!

stephenll · September 21, 2017, 8:01pm

I second this. It would be awesome to have RStudio Server on Digital Ocean and use it via an iPad.

nik · September 21, 2017, 8:26pm

I think this is a great idea! It's so much more convenient to use an iPad on a flight or on the road rather than a laptop that only lasts a few hours.

michaelbolger · September 22, 2017, 4:47am

Indulging for a moment in a little wishful thinking, beyond fully functional RStudio Server on an iPad (which will be great), a standalone RStudio app à la Pythonista would be awesome for truly portable work on the go (working on RStudio server on a train, as I do, is flakey enough--I expect in-flight wifi would be even worse). Of course, it wouldn't be possible to support all packages, certainly not those that require specific libraries etc. not available on iOS, but even a subset of packages (e.g. Tidyverse) would be a great start.

pditty · September 23, 2017, 3:17am

How I yearn for an on-device iPad R Solution.

Is this anywhere on the team's radar?

edrizik · February 26, 2018, 3:51pm

From this thread, it sounds like a functional RStudio Server on an iPad is a possibility some time soon. Is there an update on this from Jonathan the RStudio Employee?

jonathan · February 27, 2018, 11:11pm

You can follow this issue for updates:

rensa · February 28, 2018, 4:21am

I reeeeaaaally want an iPad Pro, so I'd be up for this

michaelbolger · February 28, 2018, 5:27am

Hi Jonathan, thanks for the update. Testing on our current version of RStudio (1.1.338) with an iPad Pro and an the Apple keyboard cover, some of the modifier keys also don't work, e.g.:

Control + Return does nothing
Command + Return just does a carriage return
Control/Command + Z do nothing

Not sure if these are related/are suseceptible to a similar fix?

edrizik · February 28, 2018, 5:12pm

Thank you so much Jonathan! Really looking forward to this.

clausp · April 22, 2018, 3:45pm

Are there any updates on this? We have the latest version and the keys still do not seem to be working on my iPad.

jonathan · May 3, 2018, 10:39pm

The fix is in the daily builds of RStudio, but is not yet part of a release version. Look for an RStudio 1.2 release later this year with the fix.

Note that even though you'll be able to use the arrow keys in the editor, there are a number of known issues with using RStudio Server on iOS:

https://github.com/rstudio/rstudio/labels/ios

EconomiCurtis · September 28, 2018, 11:40am