Introduction to Targets

Michael Milton, WEHI

This course is designed to encourage best practices in writing R analyses. R users will learn about using Targets package to write well-structured and performant workflows, which will make it easier to understand, modify and optimise analyses.

By the end of this training, participants will:

· Be able to explain why reproducibility is important for science

· Understand the purpose of the _targets.R file

· Be able to author a targets workflow

· Be able to run a targets workflow

· Be able to load objects built by the workflow into their R session

· Know how to organize targets projects for maximal reproducibility

· Demonstrate best practices for managing workflow dependencies

· Be able to load external data into a workflow

· Be able to use parallelism to speed up their workflow

· Be able to generate a report using targets

This free workshop is available to staff and students at The University of Melbourne and its affiliated institutes.

You must register for this event using an affiliated institutional email address or your registration may be cancelled.

This is an intermediate course and we expect learners to have moderate experience using R.

This is an in person hands-on workshop and attendees must bring their own computers (laptop chargers also recommended). No software needs to be installed for this workshop and no programming experience is necessary. The following is required:

• Access to internet via UniWireless or Eduroam
• Web browser (Firefox or Chrome recommended)

If you require any further information, or have any access requirements in order to participate in this workshop, please contact us as soon as possible to discuss your requirements:

We recommend following our Eventbrite page if you wish to be alerted when we release new workshops for registrations. If you require any further information, please contact Melbourne Bioinformatics at: [email protected]

Starting 1 August 2025, participants who miss two or more workshops without proper notice (less than 48 hours or attending under 50%) within 12 months will be placed on a 6-month waitlist for full workshops. To avoid being marked as a no-show, cancellations must be made at least 24 hours in advance, with exceptions allowed for emergencies.Please read the full policy here: https://mbite.org/guides/policy/