pcalg

2.7-12

Methods for Graphical Models and Causal Inference

17packages depend

124.7Kdownloads / year

63.9%test coverage

9/13checks pass

Overview

About

Maintained by Markus KalischFirst published 2006-06-0649 releasesCRAN page ↗

Functions for causal structure learning and causal inference using graphical models. The main algorithms for causal structure learning are PC (for observational data without hidden variables), FCI and RFCI (for observational data with hidden variables), and GIES (for a mix of data from observational studies (i.e. observational data) and data from experiments involving interventions (i.e. interventional data) without hidden variables). For causal inference the IDA algorithm, the Generalized Backdoor Criterion (GBC), the Generalized Adjustment Criterion (GAC) and some related functions are implemented. Functions for incorporating background knowledge are provided.

Install

R (CRAN)Ubuntu (r2u)

install.packages("pcalg", repos = "https://cloud.r-project.org/")

Installs the current CRAN release. Prebuilt binaries on Windows and macOS.

Release

# enable cranapt (r2u) if it is not already set up, then install
grep -rqs r2u.stat.illinois.edu /etc/apt/sources.list /etc/apt/sources.list.d/ \
  || curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/eddelbuettel/r2u/master/inst/scripts/add_cranapt_noble.sh | sudo bash
sudo apt install -y r-cran-pcalg

Fast Ubuntu binaries via r2u (no compilation). The cranapt setup runs once and is skipped when it is already enabled.

bspm (used by r2u) also needs make: sudo apt install make

Health

CRAN checks

4NOTE9OK

Failing flavors

NOTE r-devel-linux-x86_64-debian-clang
NOTE r-devel-linux-x86_64-debian-gcc
NOTE r-devel-linux-x86_64-fedora-gcc
NOTE r-devel-windows-x86_64

Slowest check: 10.9 min · r-devel-linux-x86_64-fedora-clang

Code health

Yes

Tests · ratio 0.39

63.9%

Coverage · measured lines

100%

Documentation · exports

Dependencies · direct

Check history

NOTE2026-07-24
9 OK · 4 NOTE · 0 WARNING · 0 ERROR · 0 FAILURE
ERROR2026-07-23
9 OK · 3 NOTE · 0 WARNING · 1 ERROR · 0 FAILURE
NOTE2026-07-11
12 OK · 1 NOTE · 0 WARNING · 0 ERROR · 0 FAILURE
OK2026-06-09
13 OK · 0 NOTE · 0 WARNING · 0 ERROR · 0 FAILURE
ERROR2026-06-07
12 OK · 0 NOTE · 0 WARNING · 1 ERROR · 0 FAILURE

Show 4 earlier snapshots

OK2026-04-25
12 OK · 0 NOTE · 0 WARNING · 0 ERROR · 0 FAILURE
NOTE2026-04-22
11 OK · 3 NOTE · 0 WARNING · 0 ERROR · 0 FAILURE
ERROR2026-04-18
10 OK · 3 NOTE · 0 WARNING · 1 ERROR · 0 FAILURE
NOTE2026-03-10
11 OK · 3 NOTE · 0 WARNING · 0 ERROR · 0 FAILURE

Documentation

READMENoVignettesYes · dynamicpkgdown siteNoNEWSNoCode of conductNoContributing guideNo

Examples that run: 100%
Documented parameters: 86%
Return-value docs: 97%
References docs: 61%

Downloads

124.7K

CRAN downloads in the past year

Rank #1,623 · ~342/day · ~10.4K/mo

Releases R versions

Daily download trend is not available in this view yet.

6K30 days

17K90 days

124.7K1 year

Compare downloads with other packages →

Also on569 r2u2K bioconda101 c2d4u

Dependencies

Declared dependencies

21 external dependencies (excludes base and recommended)

Depends (1)

R >= 3.5.0

Imports (17)

statsgraphicsutilsmethodsabind graph RBGL igraph ggm corpcor robustbase vcd Rcpp bdsmatrix sfsmisc (>= 1.0-26)fastICA clue

LinkingTo (3)

Rcpp RcppArmadillo BH

Suggests (7)

MASSMatrixRgraphviz mvtnorm huge ggplot2 dagitty

Enhances (0)

none

Dependency license breakdown →

Reverse dependencies

17direct

1indirect

micd qtlnet tpc BiDAG MRPC NetCoupler SID causalDisco clustNet eff2 mDAG pcgen AncReg PFCI iTOP lingamr qgraph

Code & Tests

People & History

People (17)

Maintainer (1)

Markus Kalisch

Author, Maintainer

Authors (3)

Markus Kalisch

Author, Maintainer

Alain Hauser

Author · added in 2.0-1

Martin Maechler

Author · added in 0.1-4

Contributors (14)

Nicoletta Andri

Contributor · added in 2.4-2

Diego Colombo

Contributor · added in 0.1-9

Marco Eigenmann

Contributor · added in 2.6-0

Doris Entner

Contributor · added in 2.2-0

Leonard Henckel

Contributor · added in 2.7-0

Patrik Hoyer

Contributor · added in 2.2-0

Antti Hyttinen

Contributor · added in 2.2-0

Joris Mooij

Contributor · added in 2.7-0

Show 6 more contributors

Preetam Nandy

Contributor · added in 2.4-2

Emilija Perkovic

Contributor · added in 2.4-2

Jonas Peters

Contributor · added in 2.2-0

Philipp Ruetimann

Contributor · added in 2.4-2

Manuel Schuerch

Contributor · added in 2.4-2

Daniel Stekhoven

Contributor · added in 2.4-2

Listed in earlier versions (1)

Marin Maechler

no longer listed · 0.1-3

Package Timeline

49 releases. Pick two to compare their code metrics. R releases are shown for context.

R
R 4.6.0 released · 2026-04-24
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R 4.5.0 released · 2025-04-11
2.7-12Latest
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R 4.4.0 released · 2024-04-24
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R 4.3.0 released · 2023-04-21
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R 4.1.0 released · 2021-05-18

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R 3.0.0 released · 2013-04-03
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R 2.15.0 released · 2012-03-30
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R 2.14.0 released · 2011-10-31
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R 2.13.0 released · 2011-04-13
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R 2.4.0 released · 2006-10-03
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R 2.3.0 released · 2006-04-24

Package metadata

First published: 2006-06-06
Total releases: 49 / 20 yrs
License: GPL (>= 2) OSI
Minimum R: ≥ 3.5.0
Bundled data: 2.1 MB / 7 files
Download size: 3.9 MB
Installed size: not tracked yet
With dependencies: not tracked yet

Appears in task views

Causal Inference Graphical Models

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