reactiveVal(ues)

Jan 17, 2018 #shiny #reactive

Let’s say we wish to toggle between 2 objects and assign either one of them to 1 common reactive value.

For an instance, we have a plot output and 2 buttons,
* when button one is pressed, plot displays a histogram of a normal distribution,
* when button two is pressed, plot displays a histogram of a uniform distribution.

How can we do that?
Use reactiveVal or reactiveValues.

reactiveVal is very similar to reactiveValues, except that the former is for a single reactive value (like a variable).

Documentation, click here.

library(shiny)

ui <- fluidPage(
    column(12,
           # toggle between normal or uniform distribution
           actionButton("rnorm", "Normal"),
           actionButton("runif", "Uniform")
    ),
    column(12,
           plotOutput("plot")
    )
)

server <- function(input, output, session) {
    
    # initiate a 'reactive variable'
    df <- reactiveVal(rnorm(100))  
    
    output$plot <- renderPlot({
        hist(df())
    })
    
    observeEvent(input$rnorm, {
        # update value
        df(rnorm(100))
        
        ## OR
        # new <- rnorm(100)
        # df(new)
    })
    
    observeEvent(input$runif, {
        df(runif(100))
    })
    
}

shinyApp(ui, server, options = list(height = 500))