[R] R on Linux, and R on Windows , any difference in maturity+stability?

[Kjetil Halvorsen]

On Tue, Oct 6, 2009 at 11:23 AM, Duncan Murdoch <murdoch at stats.uwo.ca> wrote:
> On 10/6/2009 10:34 AM, Jose Quesada wrote:
>>
>> Robert Wilkins <iwritecode2 <at> gmail.com> writes:
>>
>>>
>>> Will R have more glitches on one operating system as opposed to
>>> another, or is it pretty much the same?
>>>
>>> robert
>>>
>>>
>>
>> One important difference is that, if you are unsing large datasets and
>> need
>> memory, then windows is by far the worst. CRAN R is 32 bit and can only
>> address 1.5 Gb of memory (or something similar; I
>> don't really understand why).
>
> By default, 32 bit Windows only gives 2 Gb for all the user processes to
> share, and saves the rest of memory for itself.  You can change this (see
> the Windows FAQ), but the most you'll ever get is 3 Gb in 32 bit Windows,


>                 _____and a bit under 4 Gb in 64 bit Windows.________
>

That sounds incredible. ¿Why so?

Kjetil

> Duncan Murdoch
>
>>
>> While there's a 64-bit version of R for windows (revolution-computing.com)
>> I
>> would advise against using it, for several reasons. While revolution has
>> provided very nice packages to the community (e.g., foreach), the win-64
>> port as
>> of today is certainly the worst platform to do work on. Reasons:
>> (1) it's R 2.7.2
>> (2) Many important packages will never be ported
>> (3) Some packages (particularly those depending on Rjava) would not work
>> properly
>> (4) There's a proprietary repository, where most packages are outrageously
>> outdated. (5) Most help you find on R-help will not apply. Instead, you
>> have 'paid'
>> support. Said support is slow, and close to useless in most cases.
>> (6) Packages that rely on external tools (e.g., mysql) will take a lot of
>> work
>> to get going.
>> And of course, one have to pay for a yearly license, to have the privilege
>> to
>> work under the above conditions.
>>
>> If you need 64-bit right now, my advice is to switch to basically any
>> other
>> platform.
>>
>> Note: this may change any time, since they are working on a continuous
>> build
>> that will keep the releases in sync with mainstream R.
>>
>> Jose Quesada, PhD.
>> Max Planck Institute, Human Development, Berlin
>> http://www.josequesada.name/
>>
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>> http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html
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>
> ______________________________________________
> R-help at r-project.org mailing list
> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help
> PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html
> and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
>