[Rd] bug + insufficient doc in R CMD INSTALL (PR#5703)

[Kurt Hornik]

>>>>> dpierce  writes:

> Hello,
> I believe I have found a bug in the R INSTALL script
> (src/scripts/INSTALL.in). The problem comes up when a user tries to
> specify more than one "--config-args" (or, I imagine, "--config-vars") on
> the R CMD INSTALL line. In such a case, no error message is generated, but
> the first specification is silently overwritten by the second
> specification.  The process therefore fails.

> So for instance, a user contacted me after typing this:

> R CMD INSTALL
> --configure-args=-with-netcdf_incdir=/usr/local/netcdf/include
> --configure-args=-with-netcdf_libdir=/usr/local/netcdf/lib ncdf_1.1.tar.gz

> and it failed (they contacted me because I'm the maintainer of the ncdf
> package).

> I would say that this is both a bug and something that needs more
> documentation.  It's a bug because it accepts the incorrect line without
> giving an error message, but does not parse it "as expected."  And I would
> say it needs more documentation because I looked through the R docs on
> this, and could find no place where the correct syntax is given.  You
> probably already know (I didn't), but the syntax should be this instead:

> R CMD INSTALL
> --configure-args="-with-netcdf_incdir=/usr/local/netcdf/include
> -with-netcdf_libdir=/usr/local/netcdf/lib" ncdf_1.1.tar.gz

> and, of course, although I'm using the ncdf package as an example for
> concreteness, this is a general problem for any R package.

> The place in INSTALL.in that seems to be problematic is this bit:

> ...

I would have thought that the current behavior is what everyone would
expect to happen: I don't recall having come across a program where
command line options accumulate.

If really necessary, we can of course say so.  I don't think we should
change the code, as then we would need to handle *all* command line
arguments accordingly, or, even worse, special-case some command line
args ...

-k