10 The CITATION file

Appropriate citations must be included in help pages (e.g., in the see also section) and vignettes; this aspect of documentation is no different from any scientific endeavor. The file inst/CITATION can be used to specify how a package is to be cited. If this option is utilized, a maintainer can check proper formatting of the CITATION file by running readCitationFile("inst/CITATION") WITHOUT the package being loaded with a library call; This must run without error for the citation to be accurately displayed on the package landing page.

Whether or not a CITATION file is present, an automatically-generated citation will appear on the package landing page on the Bioconductor web site. For optimal formatting of author names (if a CITATION file is not present), specify the package author and maintainer using the Authors@R field as described in the Writing R Extensions manual.