ulfelder

# This script converts Freedom House's annual Freedom in the World data from
# the ugly, table-like Excel format in which it's posted into a data frame in R.
# It is set up to work on future updates, too, and should automatically adjust
# as years or countries are added.
#
# Before running this script: 
#
# 1. Open a browser & go to http://www.freedomhouse.org/report-types/freedom-world
#
# 2. Download the file "Country ratings and status, FIW 1973-2013(EXCEL)"

dsparks

# .png with Windows GDI versus .png with cairographics

doInstall <- TRUE  # Change to FALSE if you don't want packages installed.
toInstall <- c("ggplot2", "RColorBrewer", "Cairo")
if(doInstall){install.packages(toInstall, repos = "http://cran.us.r-project.org")}
lapply(toInstall, library, character.only = TRUE)

# Generate some data
nn <- 100
myData <- data.frame(X = rnorm(nn),