If I have a separate file with my compose code, is there a way to access the android R.xxx.whatever ids?

R

seems to be available, but it doesn't recognize

.string

or

.drawable

outside of an Activity class.

If you're trying to access stuff from your res directory, you need to import the R appropriate R package like:

import com.example.R

Inside composable functions you can use the function

stringResource

to get the string for a resource. You can find more information here: https://developer.android.com/jetpack/compose/resources

Awesome. Thank you @Sean Proctor!