[Rd] Setting the path to Rtools for package compilation on Windows

[Jeroen Ooms]

On Tue, Feb 13, 2018 at 7:58 PM, Peter Langfelder
<peter.langfelder at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Tue, Feb 13, 2018 at 2:20 AM, Jeroen Ooms <jeroenooms at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Thanks for your question. Your logs show that 'gcc' is not found. As
>> of R 3.3 you need to set the path to the compiler using the BINPREF
>> variable. This is because we ship two separate versions of gcc, one
>> targeting win32 and one targeting win64. I am not sure what your
>> rtools installation looks like, but could you try setting this
>> environment variable:
>>
>>   BINPREF="M:/R/Rtools-3.4/mingw_$(WIN)/bin/"
>>
>> I think this will do the job.
>
> Thanks, that indeed did the trick. May I suggest that this hint be
> also included in "REMAINING TASKS" section of the file Rtools.txt that
> is part of the Rtools distribution?  The R installation manual does
> mention BINPREF and BINPREF64 but I missed that part...

Glad it worked. Actually BINPREF64 only exists when building R itself.
For the R user there is no BINPREF64. There is only BINPREF which has
to point to a 32bit gcc when R runs in 32bit, and a 64bit compiler
when R runs in 64bit. But if you compile R packages you need both at
the same time. Hence the "$(WIN)" variable in the BINPREF above.

Yes the rtools setup is a bit convoluted, and we're currently
discussing ways to improve this. Thanks for your suggestion.