const-ae
commented
4 years ago I decided to reduce the available ties.methods not out of necessity, but to ease extension.
For reference, base::ranks() supports:
c("average", "first", "last", "random", "max", "min")
and matrixStats::rowRanks() supports:
c("max", "average", "first", "last", "random", "max", "min", "dense")
I felt that the it could be an undue burden to ask each extension to implement 7 different ties.methods. Especially, if base R only supports 6.
Of course each extension of MatrixGenerics could just give an error if a ties.methods is not supported, but this could lead to package developers avoiding the rowRanks() function, as it might break for different matrix types.
I thought that it was a good compromise to select a reduced number of ties.methods. This makes it more likely that every extension supports this reduced number of ties.methods and makes the method more reliable for users of the MatrixGenerics package. In addition, I decided that it is easier to later add ties.method's than to take on away from the API.
I decided to pick max and average mainly because those where the two that I had already implemented in sparseMatrixStats. The sparse structure means that it is tedious to implement for example ties.method = "first". However, I realize this is a subjective judgement and I am looking forward to your take which ties.method's you would put into the API?
Why was this necessary @const-ae ?