Dear R-Developement Team, I want to suggest an additiol check to the R CMD check functionality. Consider the situation where the objects of more than one package are imported to the NAMESPACE of a third package, e.g. via import(foo, bar) in the NAMESPACE file. There might be situations where exported objects in the packages `foo` and `bar` have the same name, let´s say there is an object `f` exported from both packages. Then a warning created by R CMD check comparable to the same situation when attaching multiple packages to the search path, like > library(foo) > library(bar) The following objects are masked from ‘package:foo’: f would be very helpful. I am aware that it is not best practice to import many packages with many exported objects to the NAMESPACE of another package. Nevertheless it would be nice feature to be warned about the resulting name conflict.
If memory serves, there is already a message emitted during installation about replacing a previous import. This could be elevated to a level such that it is reported by R CMD check. Not sure it's severe enough to be a warning though. Maybe just a note.
I'd say it's serious enough to be a warning. Package authors can always do their imports explicitly and avoid it. If one of their dependencies adds a new function that collides with another dependency, that can cause the package to break.