[Rd] R_AllocatePtr

[Paul Roebuck]

Had been looking into Luke Tierney's R_AllocatePtr() and
was left with a question about exactly when does R reclaim
heap memory. Implication of 'simpleref.nw' is that one can
allocate C data on the R heap, and as long as pointer object
is alive, the data and pointer will remain valid. But it
calls allocString() which is implemented using R_alloc().

'Writing R Extensions" says R will reclaim memory allocated
using R_alloc() at the end of the .Call().

Was the intent that its invocation be restricted to within
a .Call()? Doesn't sound as though it could be used to return
an SEXP from a .Call() with its data intact.

----------------------------------------------------------
SIGSIG -- signature too long (core dumped)