audit.connect

This checks that a variety of applications can be deployed to a Posit Connect Server.

Installation

The package isn’t on CRAN. Install it from GitHub with

remotes::install_github("jumpingrivers/audit.connect")

For python based deployment, the python package, rsconnect-python is required

uv pip install rsconnect-python

If rsconnect isn’t on R’s PATH, set RSCONNECT_PATH to its location.

Usage

Running the test is straightforward

library("audit.connect")
check(server = "https://www.connect.server.name/", token = "API_TOKEN")

Alternatively, you can set environmental variables, CONNECT_SERVER and CONNECT_API_KEY in your .Renviron file.

Connect Package Pollution

If you are running this package on a machine you normally use to deploy to Connect, then this isn’t an issue - you can skip the next part.

If you are using a machine where you are deploying to Connect for the first time, then read one!

Connect package pollution occurs when

• we use package manager binaries, and
• the OS on Connect differs to the OS on the deployment machine.

If you aren’t using binaries or the OS is the same, then you won’t have any issue. If you want to be sure, we can use {renv}

# Use a new, empty cache for this project, leaving your own renv cache alone
Sys.setenv(RENV_PATHS_CACHE = tempfile("renv-cache-"))
# Use the slow installation method
renv::init(repo = "https://cloud.r-project.org/")
renv::install("remotes")

Checks

check() deploys test content to Connect and deletes it afterwards. Each check has a group and a name, which are the keys in the config file.

Group	Check	What it does
deploy_git	public-github	Deploys a Shiny app from a public GitHub repository, as Git-backed content
deploy_pins	rds	Writes mtcars as an RDS pin, reads it back unchanged, then deletes it
deploy_plumber	api	Deploys a Plumber API and checks that its /echo endpoint responds
deploy_python	flask	Deploys a Python Flask API with rsconnect-python (skipped if it isn’t installed)
deploy_python	streamlit	Deploys a Python Streamlit app with rsconnect-python (skipped if it isn’t installed)
deploy_python	voila	Deploys Posit’s Voila example notebook with rsconnect-python (skipped if it isn’t installed)
deploy_shiny	basic_app	Deploys a basic Shiny app
render_quarto	beamer, docx, html, observable, pdf	Deploys a Quarto document to Connect and renders it on the server in that format
render_quarto	python	Deploys a Quarto document that uses the Jupyter engine, with rsconnect-python
render_quarto	rsvg_convert	Deploys a Quarto PDF containing an SVG image, which needs rsvg-convert on Connect
render_rmd	html, pdf, word	Deploys an R Markdown document to Connect and renders it on the server in that format

check() also reports the server details, the Connect version and the system libraries R packages need, but these aren’t configurable checks.

Config file

Experimental. You can skip deployment tests, by setting the appropriate value in config-uat-rsc.yml. This file can be auto-generated via

create_config()

If a test is missing in the config, the default value is TRUE.

Creating a test

Tests are R6 classes. To be automatically detected, the class name must start with check_. If you copy/paste the following code into R/example.R, when you run check(), the test is automatically detected and run. Likewise, create_config()

#' @export
check_example = R6::R6Class(
  "check_example",
  inherit = audit.base::base_check,
  # A function is passed to checker()
  # This runs the test, detects errors, and logs the result
  public = list(
    #' @description Runs a UAT check
    check = function(debug_level) {
      private$checker(example_test(), debug_level)
      return(invisible(NULL))
    }
  ),
  # Multiple classes can have the same group.
  # But context/short should be unique
  private = list(
    context = "Human description",
    short = "config_variable",
    group = "config_group",
    long = "A sentence describing what the check does"
  )
)

example_test = function() {
  return(TRUE)
}

Running the tests

test-check.R and test-sanitise.R deploy test content to the server in CONNECT_SERVER, so they are skipped unless AUDIT_CONNECT_LIVE is true:

Sys.setenv(AUDIT_CONNECT_LIVE = "true")
devtools::test()

Updating the manifests

The plumber test bundles in inst/extdata/ each ship a manifest.json. After changing a bundle, or to pick up newer package versions, regenerate them all at once:

source("dev/update_manifests.R")
update_manifests()

This runs rsconnect::writeManifest() under the R in /opt/R/4.4.3, because the manifest records that R version and Connect needs a matching one. Pass r_version to use another. Packages are built from CRAN source in an empty library, so the manifests never point at binaries for a different OS. Expect it to take several minutes.