# Introducing Shiny

Shiny is a new package from RStudio that makes it incredibly easy to build interactive web applications with R.

### Features

* Build useful web applications with only a few lines of code—no JavaScript required.
* Shiny applications are automatically "live" in the same way that spreadsheets are live. Outputs change instantly as users modify inputs, without requiring a reload of the browser.
* Shiny user interfaces can be built entirely using R, or can be written directly in HTML, CSS, and JavaScript for more flexibility.
* Works in any R environment (Console R, Rgui for Windows or Mac, ESS, StatET, RStudio, etc.)
* Attractive default UI theme based on [Twitter Bootstrap](http://twitter.github.com/bootstrap).
* A highly customizable slider widget with built-in support for animation.
* Pre-built output widgets for displaying plots, tables, and printed output of R objects.
* Fast bidirectional communication between the web browser and R using the [websockets](http://illposed.net/websockets.html) package.
* Uses a [reactive](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reactive_programming) programming model that eliminates messy event handling code, so you can focus on the code that really matters.
* Develop and redistribute your own Shiny widgets that other developers can easily drop into their own applications (coming soon!).

### Installation

If you've already got the Shiny package installed, you're ready to go. If you don't have Shiny yet, you'll need to:

* Request access to the beta at [http://shiny.rstudio.org](http://shiny.rstudio.org).
* Once you have been granted access to the beta, follow the instructions in the welcome e-mail to install the Shiny package.


### Let's Go!

This tutorial covers the basics of Shiny and provides detailed examples of using much of its capabilities. Click the Next button to get started and say hello to Shiny!