Are paths with hyphens supported; if so how to use it and if not why not?

[dereckmezquita]

Simple question I have paths with hyphens in them like so:

box::use(../some-path/to-a-file/some-module[ some_object ])

[klmr]

Yes, they are supported. But while they are fine in module library search paths¹, they are discouraged in module names (including prefixes), since they are not syntactically valid R names. So the usual rules for non-syntactic R names apply: in other words, they need to be quoted in backticks.

So you can write e.g.:

box::use(../`some-path`/`to-a-file`/`some-module`[ some_object ])

But generally I recommend defining module with valid names.

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¹ Your example uses a relative import declaration (since it’s starting with ../), so this doesn’t apply in this case. But for non-local modules that are imported from a search path, having hyphens in the search path would require no special handling, since - is a regular path character.

[dereckmezquita]

As always thank you @klmr!

[gacolitti]

Is this included in the documentation of box::use()? If not, I think it deserves a short callout because hyphens are commonly used.

[klmr]

Indeed, it’s documented here: https://klmr.me/box/reference/use.html#module-names