Author: Richèl J.C. Bilderbeek
Date: 2026-02-28

# tracerer versus Tracer demo

#### Richèl J.C. Bilderbeek

#### 2026-02-28

`tracerer`: ‘Tracer for R’ is an R package that does the same as Tracer does, from within R.

To use `tracerer`, it needs to be loaded:

    library(tracerer)

When loading `beast2_example_output.log` in Tracer, the following is displayed:

Tracer output

Most prominently, at the left, the effective sample sizes (ESSes) are shown.

The show the ESSes using `tracerer`:

    estimates <- parse_beast_tracelog_file(
      get_tracerer_path("beast2_example_output.log")
    )
    estimates <- remove_burn_ins(estimates, burn_in_fraction = 0.1)
    esses <- calc_esses(estimates, sample_interval = 1000)
    table <- t(esses)
    colnames(table) <- c("ESS")
    knitr::kable(table)

| ESS
--- | ---
posterior | 10
likelihood | 10
prior | 10
treeLikelihood | 10
TreeHeight | 7
BirthDeath | 10
birthRate2 | 9
relativeDeathRate2 | 6

At the top-right, some measures of the variable `posterior` is shown. To reproduce these measures in `tracerer`:

    sum_stats <- calc_summary_stats(
      estimates$posterior,
      sample_interval = 1000
    )
    table <- t(sum_stats)
    colnames(table) <- c("sum_stat")
    knitr::kable(table)

| sum_stat
--- | ---
mean | -70.58394
stderr_mean | 0.5044887
stdev | 1.681629
variance | 2.827876
median | -69.87976
mode | n/a
geom_mean | n/a
hpd_interval_low | -74.15268
hpd_interval_high | -68.68523
act | 1000
ess | 10

Unlike Tracer, in `tracerer` all summary statistics can be obtained at once:

    sum_stats <- calc_summary_stats(
      estimates,
      sample_interval = 1000
    )
    knitr::kable(sum_stats)

| mean | stderr_mean | stdev | variance | median | mode | geom_mean | hpd_interval_low | hpd_interval_high | act | ess
--- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | ---
posterior | -70.5839432 | 0.5044887 | 1.6816291 | 2.8278764 | -69.8797613 | n/a | n/a | -74.1526820 | -68.6852294 | 1000.000 | 10.000000
likelihood | -60.1725009 | 0.3964208 | 1.3214025 | 1.7461047 | -60.0504225 | n/a | n/a | -62.4090389 | -58.7371284 | 1000.000 | 10.000000
prior | -10.4114423 | 0.5424505 | 1.8081684 | 3.2694729 | -10.5950270 | n/a | n/a | -14.1703653 | -7.2820933 | 1000.000 | 10.000000
treeLikelihood | -60.1725009 | 0.3964208 | 1.3214025 | 1.7461047 | -60.0504225 | n/a | n/a | -62.4090389 | -58.7371284 | 1000.000 | 10.000000
TreeHeight | 0.9744748 | 0.1439937 | 0.3916244 | 0.1533697 | 0.8755907 | n/a | 0.91041547166058 | 0.4529637 | 1.8159958 | 1502.121 | 6.657254
BirthDeath | -3.5036870 | 0.5424505 | 1.8081684 | 3.2694729 | -3.6872718 | n/a | n/a | -7.2626100 | -0.3743380 | 1000.000 | 10.000000
birthRate2 | 1.4470488 | 0.2134411 | 0.6713951 | 0.4507714 | 1.4118781 | n/a | 1.28823302868404 | 0.3909076 | 2.8041208 | 1122.942 | 8.905181
relativeDeathRate2 | 0.4937568 | 0.0650235 | 0.1709096 | 0.0292101 | 0.4480670 | n/a | 0.466468860930895 | 0.2496224 | 0.7107459 | 1608.296 | 6.217762

At the bottom-right, a histogram of the posterior estimates is shown. To reproduce these measures in `tracerer`:

    ggplot2::ggplot(
      data = remove_burn_ins(estimates, burn_in_fraction = 0.1),
      ggplot2::aes(posterior)
    ) + ggplot2::geom_histogram(binwidth = 0.21) +
      ggplot2::scale_x_continuous(breaks = seq(-75, -68))

Tracer can also show the trace of each estimated variable:

Tracer shows the trace of the posterior likelihood

Same can be done with `tracerer`:

    ggplot2::ggplot(
      data = remove_burn_ins(estimates, burn_in_fraction = 0.1),
      ggplot2::aes(x = Sample)
    ) + ggplot2::geom_line(ggplot2::aes(y = posterior))

`tracerer` can also use part of `DensiTree`’s functionality. Here is `beast2_example_output.trees` displayed by `DensiTree`:

DensiTree output

The same is achieved in `tracerer` with:

    trees <- parse_beast_trees(
      get_tracerer_path("beast2_example_output.trees")
    )
    phangorn::densiTree(trees, width = 2)