Schedule | R Exchange Perth 2026
DAY ONE | 14 October 2026
Pre-conference workshop
1:00pm – 5:00pm
Taking the plunge into Positron — Posit's R & Python friendly Data Science IDE
Dr Kiel Hards
Half-Day Training Session
Since its beta release in 2024, Positron, the latest Data Science IDE from Posit and the spiritual successor to RStudio, has taken the open-source data science community by storm. The IDE combines the many well-loved features of RStudio with the modern interface and extensibility of VS Code, providing first-class support for both R and Python out of the box. The pace of development has been rapid: 2026 alone has brought a fully redesigned Notebook Editor, inline Quarto output, an integrated Packages pane, first-class R debugging with breakpoints, and a new unified AI assistant purpose-built for data science. Join us for an interactive training on what Positron offers including a showcase of its latest features, and an honest discussion of how to navigate the switch from RStudio and avoid common frustrations. If you aren’t set up already we can help you install Positron live during the session and will work through hands-on demonstrations of how to customise and elevate your data science workflows.
Target Audience
People working with technical and scientific data that want to learn about modern data science tooling. You might currently still use RStudio or are in the early stages of using Positron. Those looking for a structured and practical guidance on how to make the most out of Positron. No prior VS Code experience is required.
Prerequisites: R installed, basic familiarity with writing R scripts or R Markdown. As this will be a “follow on your own device” workshop, participants will need to bring along and use devices where they have approval to install Positron.
Learning Objectives
By the end of this session, participants will be able to:
- Explain what Positron is and how it differs from RStudio and VS Code, including its design philosophy and positioning in the open-source ecosystem.
- Correctly install and configure Positron on their own machine, including R and (optionally) Python interpreter setup.
- Navigate the Positron interface: the Variables pane, Console, Plots pane, Connections pane, and Editor and explain how they compare to their RStudio equivalents.
- Explain how to execute R and Python code interactively within the same session, understanding how the two languages co-exist in Positron.
- Use Positron’s productivity features including the Packages pane to manage R and Python packages, integrated Data explorer and Positron’s (now in beta) integrated Notebook editor.
- Customise their environment with extensions, settings, themes, and workspace configurations.
- Gain practical experience with data analysis and visualisation basics in Positron.
- Use Posit Assistant for AI-assisted code generation, next-edit suggestions, and agentic data science tasks, and understand how it differs from generic AI coding tools or its predecessor tools.
6:30pm
Optional welcome dinner
DAY TWO | 15 October 2026
Conference
8:30am
Doors open
9:00am
Open-source data science in a disrupted world
Dr Uli Muellner & Dr Petra Muellner | Epi
9:15am
AI in secure environments
Details to be announced
9:45am
From Book to Browser: digitising the Health of Queenslanders Report with reproducible data and reporting workflows
Dr Shelly Lachish | Queensland Health
The Queensland Chief Health Officer’s Health of Queenslanders Report (CHO Report) has evolved from a static, printed, magazine-style publication into a web-based digital resource featuring interactive visualisations and dashboards. In this talk, I’ll share that journey from book to browser, focusing on the technical, cultural, and organisational aspects of moving a large, complex public health report into the digital space.
I’ll describe how the CHO production team rapidly adopted a new way of working: moving from STATA to R, embracing literate programming with R Markdown (more recently Quarto), building reusable R packages and data pipelines, standardising data structures, introducing version control, and developing interactive visualisations. Together, these changes have made it easier to manage a diverse collection of datasets, analyses and reporting requirements, while creating content that is faster to produce, more consistent and increasingly reproducible.
Along the way, I’ll reflect on some practical realities of digital transformation: navigating organisational IT barriers, “moving at the speed of trust” when introducing new tools, and discovering that some processes stubbornly resist automation.
This is a practical look at modernising public health reporting in a real-world setting.
10:10am
Shiny as a tool for collaborative data exploration
Nathan Dunn | Cancer Alliance Queensland
Analysts are often asked to rerun the same analysis for different cohorts, time periods, or parameters. While each request may be small, the cumulative effort can be substantial.
At Cancer Alliance Queensland, we have increasingly used Shiny to reduce this burden by enabling clinicians, managers, and analysts to explore data themselves. Interactive applications allow users to answer routine questions, test assumptions, and investigate trends without requiring a new report or analysis each time.
This presentation will demonstrate how Shiny has been used to support collaborative data exploration in a healthcare setting, from analyst-facing tools to dashboards used by clinical stakeholders. I will share examples, lessons learned, and the benefits we have seen in stakeholder engagement, efficiency, and reproducibility.
10:35am
Session Q & A
10:45am
Morning tea
11:30am
Workshops
Taking your automated reporting game to the next level with Quarto
Hosted by Dr Kiel Hards
Quarto is one of Posit’s latest multi-language reporting offerings. It is an open-source scientific and technical publishing system that allows users to publish reproducible, production quality articles, presentations and dashboards. Having been rigorously developed by the team at Posit as the ‘successor’ to R Markdown, the framework offers full backwards compatibility with the original features of R Markdown, along with new features such as language support for Python and Julia, formats such as presentations, PDF, Microsoft Word, even website and ebook formats! You can even use Quarto documents as an environment for your data science experimentation, thanks to the multi-language integration which allows you to run code directly from the Quarto document itself. The framework uses a rich Markdown syntax to provide access to powerful technical and scientific notations such as equations, citations, figures, cross-references, advanced layouts and more. Quarto documents can easily be automated and published to online services such as Posit Connect or Confluence whenever your data changes. Join us to learn how to harness the power of Quarto to dynamically create and share high quality reports and presentations, fit these reports into your existing R or Python workflow and have all your favourite analytics built straight in!
Open source data science in restricted environments
Hosted by Dr Uli Muellner
Open-source tooling offers capabilities that are crucial for data manipulation, exploration, visualisation, modelling, and machine learning. However a common frustration is that they are often “un-officially” in use within organisations, and access restrictions hinder the development of a fully established data science infrastructure for technical and scientific data. In this talk we will explore common pain points relating to accessing open-source data science coding tools and the deployment of data products like Quarto or Shiny in different organisations. We explain when (and when not) the Posit Enterprise products Workbench (for coding), Connect (for deployment) and Package Manager (for secure access to R/Py packages) are needed and how to get the most out of the licenses. We will also dive into emerging capabilities, such managing AI and LLM workflows with the Model Context Protocol (MCP) support in Posit Connect and how local LLMs can be paired with Posit tools to sandbox and explore AI capability in a secure environment.
1:00pm
Networking lunch
2:30pm
Bringing next generation mapping approaches to R with the Toro package
Dr Kiel Hards | Epi
Interactive spatial visualizations are a cornerstone for understanding and communicating complexity in almost all technical and scientific disciplines and are commonly embedded in reports or interactive dashboards. As the amount of data grows as well the pressure to create operational intelligence grows existing tools used to generate and display maps hit their performance ceiling. They often lack modern features essential for complex datasets such as those arising from large scale or multi-year projects. MapLibre GL JS is an open-source JavaScript/TypeScript library for rendering interactive maps in the browser using WebGL (and soon WebGPU) that is built from the ground up for responsiveness and scale. To enable report and dashboard developers in R to leverage this powerful library, the team at Epi developed Toro: a R package providing bindings to MapLibre GL JS, allowing users to create interactive maps that can easily be integrated into both Quarto and the R Shiny dashboard framework. In this talk, we will discuss the technical challenges we had to overcome during the development of the package and provide examples of how Toro enabled spatial visualisation and exploration of data that otherwise would have been limited, too slow or too hard to scale using traditional tools.
3:00pm
Generating impact with bespoke open-source tools to conserve marine biodiversity at scale
Matt Fraser | Minderoo Foundation
eDNA data has the potential to improve our ability to make science-based decisions across a wide range of objectives – from community efforts to large scale ecological and conservation measures. However, if the insights created are fragmented, not accessible and do not connect with stakeholders and operational needs, eDNA will fail to live up to its potential. This presentation will showcase how Minderoo's Oceanomics team uses storytelling dashboards (built in R Shiny) in a variety of contexts to bridge these gaps to embed eDNA science into day-to-day decision making and stakeholder engagement. It will further demonstrate how operational intelligence and decision support can be provided for highly diverse users via a dedicated open platform that allows for custom queries, notifications and demonstrates the value of data sharing across institutional and country boundaries.
3:20pm
Guest speakers
We would love to hear how you are working with open-source tools! If you would like to contribute, please send your proposed title and a short bio (<100 words) and abstract (<300 words) to events@epi.group by August 16, 2026.
Registration is complimentary for all speakers.
4:00pm
Conference wrap-up
4:10pm