Optional Type Specification Prototype
A prototype for a mechanism for specifying the types of parameters and the return value for an R function. This is meta-information that can be used to generate stubs for servers and various interfaces to these functions. Additionally, the arguments in a call to a typed function can be validated using the type specifications. We allow types to be specified as either i) by class name using either inheritance - is(x, className), or strict instance of - class(x) %in% className, or ii) a dynamic test given as an R expression which is evaluated at run-time. More precise information and interesting tests can be done via ii), but it is harder to use this information as meta-data as it requires more effort to interpret it and it is of course run-time information. It is typically more meaningful.
