[Rd] MacOS X: update.packages(type="mac.binary") fails (PR#7836)

Prof Brian Ripley ripley at stats.ox.ac.uk
Wed May 4 10:01:47 CEST 2005


On Wed, 4 May 2005 jarioksa at sun3.oulu.fi wrote:

> Message 2 of today: it works now.
>
> After re-installing R.app from the same R-2.1.0.dmg file, and
> fixInNamespace'ing(*) install.packages(), I managed to update 23
> outdated packages from CRAN binaries for MacOS X. What I did was to:
>
> 1. change call to .install.macbinaries() into call to install.binaries()
> in install.packages(). install.binaries() is a function defined
> utils/R/aqua/GUI.R.
> 2. I also had to remove argument 'dependencies' since that is not
> defined in install.binaries() of utils/aqua.

The point is that the omitted .install.macbinaries() does support 
dependencies and has several other improvements over install.binaries().

> It seems that install.binaries of utils/aqua is mentioned in several
> places in R sources, but .install.macbinary() appears only in one place,
> so changing install.packages() is less hassle than changing
> utils/R/aqua/GUI.R and all other places (although this looks more
> natural).
>
> This still requires a fix in passing type in update.packages() that B.
> Ripley already did for R 2.1.1, or setting
> options(pkgType="mac.binary").

This should not be required. What does .Platform say?

> cheers, jari oksanen
>
> (*) "Object-oriented programming is an exceptionally bad idea which
> could only have originated in California." E. Dijkstra
>
> On Tue, 2005-05-03 at 16:14 +0100, Prof Brian Ripley wrote:
>> Binary installs are AFAIK only supported in the GUI, where the default is
>> as documented.  So .install.macbinary() is not loaded except in the GUI.
>>
>> The reason is that those binaries are tied to that particular build of R,
>> and will not work with a general build on MacOS X.
>>
>> I would expect this to work from the command-line in the GUI console, and
>> had believed it had been tested there.
>>
>>
>> On Tue, 3 May 2005 jari.oksanen at oulu.fi wrote:
>>
>>> Full_Name: Jari Oksanen
>>> Version: R 2.1.0
>>> OS: MacOS 10.3.9
>>> Submission from: (NULL) (130.231.102.145)
>>>
>>>
>>> For various reasons (which need not be expanded here) I have tried to update my
>>> long neglected R in MacOS X using handy command line tool update.packages()
>>> using readily available binaries of contributed packages at CRAN. However, this
>>> fails with message saying that packages xxxx_*_tar.gz is not found at the server
>>> (HTTP error 404). Obviously, the package name is expanded wrongly as the binary
>>> packages for MacOS X have type *.tgz. However, this seems not be the problem,
>>> but there are two other problems:
>>>
>>> 1. update.packages does not transfer the value of 'type' to the next function
>>> install.packages, but install.packages uses the value of getOption("pkgType")
>>> which seems to be "source" in CRAN binary of MacOS X (contrary to documentation
>>> at ?options).
>>>
>>> 2. If this is corrected, or first set options(pkgType="mac.binary"), the update
>>> fails for missing function .install.macbinary().
>>>
>>> The first problem is easy to correct:
>>>
>>> --- update.packages.R   2005-05-03 17:13:36.000000000 +0300
>>> +++ jarioksa.update.packages.R  2005-05-03 17:13:58.000000000 +0300
>>> @@ -59,5 +59,5 @@
>>>          install.packages(update[, "Package"], instlib, contriburl =
>>> contriburl,
>>>              method = method, available = available, destdir = destdir,
>>> -            installWithVers = installWithVers, type)
>>> +            installWithVers = installWithVers, type = type)
>>>      }
>>>  }
>>>
>>>
>>> For the second, problem, I don't know what to do. grepping
>>> R-patched_2005-05-03.tar.gz source found only one instance of
>>> .install.macbinary(): the failed call in
>>> R-patched/src/library/utils/R/packages2.R. I couldn't find the definition of the
>>> function.
>>>
>>> Do I really have to use GUI? Uh.
>>>
>>> cheers, jari oksanen
>>>
>>> ______________________________________________
>>> R-devel at stat.math.ethz.ch mailing list
>>> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel
>>>
>>>
>>
>
> ______________________________________________
> R-devel at stat.math.ethz.ch mailing list
> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel
>
>

-- 
Brian D. Ripley,                  ripley at stats.ox.ac.uk
Professor of Applied Statistics,  http://www.stats.ox.ac.uk/~ripley/
University of Oxford,             Tel:  +44 1865 272861 (self)
1 South Parks Road,                     +44 1865 272866 (PA)
Oxford OX1 3TG, UK                Fax:  +44 1865 272595



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