[R] problem installing packages from source on win2k

[Prof Brian Ripley]

The short answer is that you are not following readme.packages, which says

  If you want to make compiled html (.chm) files you will need the
  Microsoft HTML Help Workshop, currently available for download at
  http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/en-us/htmlhelp/html/hwmicrosofthtmlhelpdownloads.asp
  and http://www.microsoft.com/office/ork/xp/appndx/appa06.htm

  All of these need to be installed and in your path, and the
  appropriate environment variables set.  

hhc.exe is part of HHW, and it is not in your path.

If you don't want to make .chm files, you can edit src/gnuwin32/MkRules 
appropriately.

On Fri, 13 Jun 2003, Simon Cawley wrote:

> 
> Dear R-helpers,
> 
> I'm having trouble compiling R packages from source on Win2K.  I
> installed R 1.7.1beta [1] on my win2k machine [2], downloaded the fields
> package as source [3] and tried but failed to install the package [4].  
> I get the same problem with other packages, so it doesn't appear to be
> limited to fields.  Installation of precompiled packages seems to work
> fine.  I've been doing this on linux for a long time and never ran into
> such an issue.

Maybe someone else set your Linux box up so all the tools were installed?

> I've trawled the FAQ and the archives but I'm not finding anything.  
> Any clues where I'm going wrong?

> Thanks in advance,
> 
> -Simon
> 
> ##############
> 
> Notes:
> 
> [1] Version of R: 1.7.1 Beta, obtained from <http://www.stats.uwo.ca/faculty/murdoch/software/r-devel/rw1071beta.exe> on 6-13-2003
> 
> [2] Output from version:
>   platform i386-pc-mingw32
>   arch     i386           
>   os       mingw32        
>   system   i386, mingw32  
>   status   Beta           
>   major    1              
>   minor    7.1            
>   year     2003           
>   month    06             
>   day      06             
>   language R  
> 
> [3] fields 1.3.1 package downloaded from <http://cran.stat.ucla.edu/src/contrib/fields_1.3-1.tar.gz>.
> 
> [4] within cygwin bash shell, I ran the following:
>   Rcmd install fields_1.3-1.tar.gz
> which dies with the error
> .
> hhc: not found
> cp: cannot stat `c:/tmp/R.INSTALL/fields/chm/fields.chm': No such file or directory
> make[1]: *** [chm-fields] Error 1
> make: *** [pkg-fields] Error 2
> *** Installation of fields failed ***


-- 
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