[Rd] problem running test on a system without /etc/localtime

[Martin Maechler]

>>>>> Henrik Bengtsson <henrik.bengtsson at gmail.com>
>>>>>     on Tue, 16 May 2017 20:49:02 -0700 writes:

    > On Tue, May 16, 2017 at 5:35 PM, Kirill Maslinsky <kirill at altlinux.org> wrote:
    >> Hi all,
    >> 
    >> A problem with tests while building R.
    >> 
    >> I'm packaging R for Sisyphus repository and package build environment,
    >> by design, doesn't have /etc/localtime file present. This causes failure
    >> with Sys.timeone during test run:
    >> 
    >> [builder at localhost tests]$ ../bin/R --vanilla < reg-tests-1d.R
    >> 
    >>> ## PR#17186 - Sys.timezone() on some Debian-derived platforms
    >>> (S.t <- Sys.timezone())
    >> Error in normalizePath("/etc/localtime") :
    >> (converted from warning) path[1]="/etc/localtime": No such file or
    >> directory
    >> Calls: Sys.timezone -> normalizePath
    >> Execution halted
    >> 
    >> This is caused by this code:
    >> 
    >>> Sys.timezone
    >> function (location = TRUE)
    >> {
    >> tz <- Sys.getenv("TZ", names = FALSE)
    >> if (!location || nzchar(tz))
    >> return(Sys.getenv("TZ", unset = NA_character_))
    >>>> lt <- normalizePath("/etc/localtime")
    >> [remainder of the code skkipped]
    >> 
    >> File /etc/loclatime is optional and is not guaranteed to be present on
    >> any platform. And anyway, it is a good idea to first check that file
    >> exists before calling normalizePath.

    > Looking at the code
    > (https://github.com/wch/r-source/blob/R-3-4-branch/src/library/base/R/datetime.R#L26),
    > could it be that mustWork = FALSE (instead of the default NA) avoids
    > the warning causes this check error?

Good idea.

Kirill, could you apply the minimal patch to the sources and
report back ?


    > Index: src/library/base/R/datetime.R
    > ===================================================================
    > --- src/library/base/R/datetime.R (revision 72684)
    > +++ src/library/base/R/datetime.R (working copy)
    > @@ -23,7 +23,7 @@
    > {
    > tz <- Sys.getenv("TZ", names = FALSE)
    > if(!location || nzchar(tz)) return(Sys.getenv("TZ", unset = NA_character_))
    > -    lt <- normalizePath("/etc/localtime") # Linux, macOS, ...
    > +    lt <- normalizePath("/etc/localtime", mustWork = FALSE) # Linux, macOS, ...
    > if (grepl(pat <- "^/usr/share/zoneinfo/", lt)) sub(pat, "", lt)
    > else if (lt == "/etc/localtime" && file.exists("/etc/timezone") &&
    > dir.exists("/usr/share/zoneinfo") &&

    > /Henrik

    >> 
    >> Sure, this can be worked around by setting TZ environment variable, but
    >> that causes tests to fail in another place:
    >> 
    >> [builder at localhost tests]$ TZ="GMT" ../bin/R --vanilla < reg-tests-1d.R
    >> 
    >>> ## format()ing invalid hand-constructed  POSIXlt  objects
    >>> d <- as.POSIXlt("2016-12-06"); d$zone <- 1
    >>> tools::assertError(format(d))
    >> Error: Failed to get error in evaluating format(d)
    >> Execution halted
    >> 
    >> It seems that the best solution will be to patch Sys.timezone.
    >> 
    >> --
    >> KM
    >> 
    >> ______________________________________________
    >> R-devel at r-project.org mailing list
    >> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel

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