2. Create a block

    library(blockr.core)

## Creating blocks

Note: If you are not already familiar with Shiny modules, it is recommended you familiarize yourself with them before continuing with this section.

`blockr.core` is built on top of Shiny. At its heart, a block is nothing more than a specialized Shiny module that returns two additional values:

- An expression (called “expr”), a reactive expression defining a blocks computation. This allows R code to be exported and data analyses to be recreated, outside of blockr and a reactive context.
- A state object (called “state”), a list of reactive values tracking user inputs. This allows blocks to separate user-defined state from inputs specified by blocks.

While blocks return the “expr” and “state” values, blocks consist of three elements:

1. A UI function to define the user interface.
2. A Server function to handle reactive logic that returns an expression and state object.
3. A Constructor function wraps the UI and server to initialize the block state.

Now, let’s go through each element, building up a block template as we go.

### UI function

A UI function in blockr is the same as a UI function in a Shiny module. This means that:

- The UI function signature is expected to contain a single `id` argument, which can be used with `shiny::NS()` to construct namespaced IDs.
- A call to appropriate shiny UI functions is expected that return `shiny.tag` or `shiny.tag.list` objects, typically via the use of `shiny::tagList()` in the UI to list separate UI elements.

Let’s start to build our block template:

    ui <- function(id) {
      tagList(
        # Wrap widgets in `tagList()`
        textInput(
          NS(id, "my_input") # Use `shiny::NS()` to construct namespaces
        )
      )
    }

### Server function

As inputs, a server function takes an id and any additional inputs from other blocks (e.g., data). For example, for the blocks shipped with blockr.core, this would result in zero inputs for a data block, one for a transform block such as a select block, two for a join block and the special argument `...args` for variadic blocks, such as an `rbind` block.

A server function should return as output a `moduleServer()` call, defining:

- expr: A quoted reactive expression representing the block’s computation. Data names should match between expression and the top-level server function arguments.
- state: A list of reactive values tracking user selections. The set of returned values from the state should match (both in count and names) that of the constructor signature.

    server <- function(id, data) {
      moduleServer(id, function(input, output, session) {
        # Reactive logic goes here

        # Return a list with "expr" and "state"
        list(
          expr = reactive(quote(identity(data))),
          state = list(
            input_one = reactive(input_one()),
            input_two = reactive(input_two())
          )
        )
      })
    }

Many options exist to build expressions, such as using tools offered by the `rlang` package or by passing a string to `base::parse()`. As a block developer you are free to choose the tools that your prefer, as long as the evaluated expression returns non-reactive R code which can be executed outside of blockr.

The state is needed for serialization and deserialization to respectively save and restore the state of a blockr application.

### Constructor function

The constructor function wraps the UI and server functions and initializes the block. Note that both `server` and `ui` are closures and therefore may refer to names bound in the constructor scope (e.g. `dataset` and `choices`).

It should expose as arguments anything the user might set via the UI to control the block state. In other words, any inputs in the UI function, should have a corresponding argument in the constructor function. On the other hand, inputs from other blocks should not be exposed as arguments, as these are dynamically provided in the server function.

The return value should be a call to `new_block()` (or if applicable a call to the more specific virtual constructors `new_data_block()`, `new_transform_block()`, etc.).

We can finish our block template:

    example_constructor <- function(ui_state = character(), ...) {
      ui <- function(id) {
        tagList(textInput(NS(id, "ui_state")))
      }

      server <- function(id, data) {
        moduleServer(id, function(input, output, session) {
          # Reactive logic goes here

          # Return a list with "expr" and "state"
          list(
            expr = reactive(quote(identity(data))),
            state = list(
              # name must match what is defined in the constructor signature
              ui_state = <STATE_VALUE>
            )
          )
        })
      }

      # Return call to `new_block()`
      new_block(
        server = server,
        ui = ui,
        class = "my_block",
        ...
      )
    }

The `...` is forwarded to `new_block` or any `new_*_block`.

### Example

Putting this all together, we can create a `utils::head()` block, such as the one offered as `new_head_block()`:

    new_head_block <- function(n = 6L, ...) {
      new_transform_block(
        function(id, data) {
          moduleServer(
            id,
            function(input, output, session) {
              n_rows <- reactiveVal(n)

              observeEvent(input$n, n_rows(input$n))

              observeEvent(
                nrow(data()),
                updateNumericInput(
                  inputId = "n",
                  value = n_rows(),
                  min = 1L,
                  max = nrow(data())
                )
              )

              list(
                expr = reactive(
                  bquote(utils::head(data, n = .(n)), list(n = n_rows()))
                ),
                state = list(
                  n = n_rows
                )
              )
            }
          )
        },
        function(id) {
          tagList(
            numericInput(
              inputId = NS(id, "n"),
              label = "Number of rows",
              value = n,
              min = 1L
            )
          )
        },
        dat_val = function(data) {
          stopifnot(is.data.frame(data) || is.matrix(data))
        },
        class = "head_block",
        ...
      )
    }

Here, the state return value is a list of length 1, containing the current value for the only constructor argument. The current value for `n` is represented by a `shiny::reactiveVal()`, `n_rows()`, which is initialized with the values `n` in the constructor scope and updated on every change to `input$n`. Furthermore the `max` value for the `shiny::numericInput()` field is updated on every change to the number of data rows.

A final `block` constructor argument of note might be `dat_val`, which is an optional function that can be passed which signals to the framework, if data passed to a block, can actually be processed by the block.

An app containing such a head block can be spun up as

    serve(new_head_block(n = 10L), list(data = mtcars))

For an example with multiple data inputs, refer to examples such as `new_merge_block()`. Such a binary block (with arguments `x` and `y`) can be explored in a standalone app (with nonsensical inputs) as

    serve(
      new_merge_block(by = "Time"),
      data = list(x = datasets::BOD, y = datasets::ChickWeight)
    )

The `data` argument to `serve()` expects a list with names components that match the server function signature, i.e. `data` for `new_head_block()` and `x`, `y` for `new_merge_block()`. Such names can be chosen freely by the block implementer (with the exception of integer-valued names, such as ``1``, ``2``, etc. which are reserved as positional arguments in `...args`).

### More complex examples

The above example showed how to embed a typical R function into a block. However, `blockr.core` can do much more. What about creating an entire block around an existing complex Shiny module?

In the following, we expose how you could wrap a block around `esquisse`, a package to build ggplot without coding. `esquisse` exports standalone modules you can embed in any existing shiny app. Specifically, we consider `esquisse_server()` and `esquisse_ui()`. `esquisse_server()` needs some rectangular data as input and returns a list of 3 elements: modified data, code plot and filters code:

    results <- esquisse::esquisse_server(
      id = "esquisse",
      data_rv = data
    )

    results$data
    results$code_filters
    results$code_plot

When filters are applied with `esquisse`, the returned data are filtered, otherwise the module returns the unchanged input data. Based on what we already know about constructing block, we can write the following code for the constructor server function. This block will have 1 input materialized as the `data` parameter (data coming from the upstream block):

    esquisse_block_server <- function(id, data) {
      moduleServer(
        id,
        function(input, output, session) {
          results <- esquisse::esquisse_server(
            id = "esquisse",
            data_rv = data
          )
          list(
            expr = reactive({
              bquote(
                list(
                  dat = as.data.frame(.(dat)),
                  filters = .(filters)
                ),
                list(
                  filters = results$code_plot,
                  dat = results$data
                )
              )
            }),
            state = list()
          )
        }
      )
    }

In the server module, we first call `esquisse_server()`. Then, the most technical part is to construct the returned value. We decide that the block is stateless, as in any case `esquisse` doesn’t handle starting the module in a specific state, so that would be useless to save something. The expression is composed of 2 elements, the data and plot code. By default, if we assume our `esquisse` block to be a `transform_block,` `blockr.core` uses `block_output.transform_block` to display the block output:

    block_output.transform_block <- function(x, result, session) {
      dt_result(result, x, session)
    }

This S3 method can only handle rectangular data and not a list as we specified in `esquisse_block_server()`. We therefore have to create a new class and constructor for our `esquisse` block, we call it `complex_block` and `new_complex_block()`, respectively:

    new_complex_block <- function(server, ui, class, ctor = sys.parent(), ...) {
      new_block(server, ui, c(class, "complex_block"), ctor, ...)
    }

As you may notice, `new_complex_block()` is very similar to `new_transform_block`, the only difference being the class name. We subsequently define a new S3 method for `block_output()`, which is able to process our `list` result (don’t forget the `@export` roxygen tag):

    #' @export
    block_output.complex_block <- function(x, result, session) {
      session$output$filters <- renderPrint(result$filters)
      dt_result(result$dat, x, session)
    }

We also provide the UI counter part. Here you could go for more fancy layout but for sake of simplicity, we design a minimalistic UI:

    #' @export
    block_ui.complex_block <- function(id, x, ...) {
      tagList(
        h1("Transformed data from {esquisse}"),
        DT::dataTableOutput(NS(id, "result")),
        verbatimTextOutput(NS(id, "filters"))
      )
    }

The UI function of our constructor is simple, even though you would be totally free to customize it further:

    esquisse_block_ui <- function(id) {
      tagList(
        esquisse::esquisse_ui(
          id = NS(id, "esquisse"),
          header = FALSE # dont display gadget title
        )
      )
    }

Finally our new `esquisse` block constructor given by:

    new_esquisse_block <- function(...) {
      new_complex_block(
        server = esquisse_block_server,
        ui = esquisse_block_ui,
        class = "esquisse_block",
        dat_valid = NULL,
        allow_empty_state = TRUE,
        ...
      )
    }

To test our new block we call:

    serve(
      new_board(
        blocks = list(
          a = new_dataset_block(iris),
          b = new_esquisse_block()
        ),
        links = list(
          new_link("a", "b", "data")
        )
      )
    )

As closing remark, since the `esquisse` block is stateless, save and restore won’t work for this block.

> Note

> The demo below runs with shinylive. Not all feature may work as expected due to compatibility issues with webR.