[ESS] ESS and R... death to Emacs...

Dan Bolser dmb at mrc-dunn.cam.ac.uk
Thu Mar 16 13:01:45 CET 2006


Martin Maechler wrote:
>>>>>>"Dan" == Dan Bolser <dmb at mrc-dunn.cam.ac.uk>
>>>>>>    on Thu, 16 Mar 2006 10:26:54 +0000 writes:
> 
> 
>     Dan> Hi,
>     Dan> I am R Version 2.2.1  (2005-12-20 r36812)
>     Dan> ESS version 5.2.12
>     Dan> Linux 2.6.15-1.1833_FC4 i686 athlon i386 GNU/Linux
> 
> 
>     Dan> The following R/ESS session causes a permanant 'hang', and kills my 
>     Dan> emacs session...
> 
>     Dan> # Start Emacs,
>     Dan> # Start an R process (M-x R)
>     Dan> # Evaluate the following line;
>     Dan> par(ask=T)
> 
>     Dan> # Evaluate the following *region*;
>     Dan> plot(rnorm(50))
>     Dan> plot(rnorm(50))
> 
> 
> 
>     Dan> When the last two lines are sent *together* to the R process (via M-x 
>     Dan> ess-eval-region), the session 'crashes'.
> 
>     Dan> Anyone else got the same problem?
> 
> I see no problem (GNU emacs 21.3).

Hmmm... I am GNU Emacs 21.4.1... not sure if that will make a diff.

Can I just confirm that you did the steps *exactly* as specified 
(because it 'kills' my emacs session 100% of the time)...

1) start an R process from within a buffer of emacs (M-x R)
2) (actually) split the screen (C-x 2)
3) (actually) jump back to the original buffer (C-x b <ret>)
4) send the first line 'par(ask=T)' with 'ess-eval-line' (and <ret>)
5) send the following *region* after marking with the mouse...

plot(rnorm(50))
plot(rnorm(50))

using ess-eval-region

...

My emacs session is hanging...

Is there an option to set to allow me to see R 'thinking' while it is 
buisy? Like if I had a big loop that output progress information, all 
the progress information gets dumped at the end, after the loop has 
finished. I would like to see progress 'as it happens' ... I think it is 
  related to this problem (anybody else see that with different version 
of emacs?)

Cheers,
Dan.





> Martin Maechler, ETH Zurich
> 
>     Dan> Basically I think the fact that the emacs buffer 'hangs' while R is 
>     Dan> 'buisy' causes the problem. The first plot request is sent, and the 
>     Dan> buffer hangs as R becomes 'buisy', then R asks for user input, but that 
>     Dan> request is never echoed back to the user (because the buffer is 
>     Dan> 'hanging'). This is just a guess.
> 
>     Dan> If the emacs buffer didn't go unresponsive while R is buisy, I don't 
>     Dan> think this problem would occur. Like when you run a big process in R, 
>     Dan> you can't use that emacs session for anything else because it is waiting 
>     Dan> on R to finish.
> 
>     Dan> Any way to get round this 'hang'?
> 
> 
>     Dan> Cheers,
>     Dan> Dan.
> 
>     Dan> ______________________________________________
>     Dan> ESS-help at stat.math.ethz.ch mailing list
>     Dan> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/ess-help




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