Create new class for handling input parameters

[zkamvar]

Currently the way to enter parameters for matching data is quite awkward as it a list of lists:

funlist <- list(
             list(d1vars = "ID",
                  d2vars = "ID",
                  fun = "nameDists",
                  extraparams = NULL,
                  weight = 1),
             list(d1vars = c("Surname", "OtherNames"),
                  d2vars = c("SurnameLab", "OtherNameLab"),
                  fun = "nameDists",
                  extraparams = NULL,
                  weight = 0.5)
           )

Instead of this monstrosity, it could be converted into a couple of S4 class objects and given accessors (and subsetters like "[["). This way the process could be something like:

IDparam <- new("paramclass", fun = "nameDists")
NAMEparam <- new("paramclass", fun = "nameDists")

vars(IDparam)     <- list("ID", "ID")
vars(NAMEparam)   <- list(c("Surname", "OtherNames"), c("SurnameLab", "OtherNameLab"))
weight(IDparam)   <- 1
weight(NAMEparam) <- 0.5

funlist <- new("epiclass", IDparam, NAMEparam)

[thibautjombart]

Looks nicer to me, but not sure what the anti S4 brigade will say ;)