[R] dyn.load Excel add-in on Windows XP and XLCall32.dll

[davidr@rhotrading.com]

I am on Win XP SP2 using R 2.0.1 patched.
I could not find anything apropos in the archives or with search engines.
(But maybe I need to be taught how to search better.)

I am trying to dyn.load some commercial DLLs (Excel add-ins),
but I get a message box saying:

"This application has failed to start because XLCall32.dll was not found."

The message in R is:

Error in dyn.load(x, as.logical(local), as.logical(now)) : 
        unable to load shared library "<correct path>":
  LoadLibrary failure:  The specified module could not be found.

The DLLs work in Excel without my system having XLCall32.dll anywhere;
(I believe it was removed from 2000 and XP for security reasons.)
So possibly there is no real dependency there? (Cygwin strings command
does find that word in the DLLs, though.)

Is there a workaround for this, do I need to write an R-compatible wrapper,
or is it just impossible?

(I was able to load other DLLs (non-Excel add-ins), just as a test.)

Thanks for any pointers!

David L. Reiner
Rho Trading
Chicago  IL  60605