[Rd] Environment variable MAKE not defined on Windows

[Martin Morgan]

Duncan Murdoch <murdoch at stats.uwo.ca> writes:

> On 6/9/2006 4:03 PM, Martin Morgan wrote:
>> On Windows,
>>
>>> Sys.getenv("MAKE")
>>   MAKE "" when (at a DOS prompt)
>> X:>set MAKE
>> Environment variable MAKE not defined
>
> Most Windows systems don't have a working "make" command, and I don't
> know of a reliable test for one.  

I guess on non-Windows systems MAKE gets defined when R is
built. Perhaps a similar thing should happen when I build my own R on
Windows, because then I must have a working make?

I realize that the windows R is distributed in binary form; perhaps
these could be configured not to include MAKE and other environmental
variables? For instance, I notice some unlikely-to-be-generally-useful
variables like PERL5LIB and TEXINPUTS hard-coded in

R_HOME/src/gnuwin32/front-ends/rcmdfn.c

Also, the documentation ?Startup is not correct, at least if 'factory
fresh' means newly built -- there does not appear to be an
etc/Renviron.site on Windows.

Description:

   The name of the site file is the one pointed to by the environment
   variable 'R_ENVIRON'; if this is unset or empty,
   '$R_HOME/etc/Renviron.site' is used (if it exists, which it does
   not in a "factory-fresh" installation except on Windows). 

Finally, the buildVignettes() code might be modified to more
forcefully notify the user of the inadequacies of their system.

Martin   

> (I believe the one that ships with MS compilers is not compatible
> with R's makefiles.)  If you do have one, you can define MAKE=make
> on the Rgui or Rterm command line.
>
> Duncan Murdoch