[R] system(..., invisible=FALSE, show.output.on.console=FALSE) in Windows 7

[jim holtman]

I see something similar on my system.  Running your command line, I
can see the command window flashup and then disappear.

> sessionInfo()
R version 2.12.1 (2010-12-16)
Platform: i386-pc-mingw32/i386 (32-bit)

locale:
[1] LC_COLLATE=English_United States.1252  LC_CTYPE=English_United
States.1252
[3] LC_MONETARY=English_United States.1252 LC_NUMERIC=C
[5] LC_TIME=English_United States.1252

attached base packages:
[1] tcltk     stats     grDevices utils     datasets  graphics
methods   base

other attached packages:
 [1] RColorBrewer_1.0-2    sqldf_0.3-5           chron_2.3-39
gsubfn_0.5-5
 [5] proto_0.3-8           RSQLite.extfuns_0.0.1 RSQLite_0.9-4
DBI_0.2-5
 [9] zoo_1.6-4             plyr_1.4

loaded via a namespace (and not attached):
[1] grid_2.12.1     lattice_0.19-17 tools_2.12.1
>


On Wed, Mar 9, 2011 at 12:14 PM, Ralph Olsson
<ralpholsson at btinternet.com> wrote:
> Hello,
>
> I work for a company in which a number of employees use R. Many of them like to run executables via the system function in such a way that the output of that executable is displayed in a separate window. To give an example of the behavior they require, the following command can be run in R GUI:
>
> system("cmd",invisible=FALSE,show.output.on.console=FALSE)
>
> The result is that a command prompt opens up and can be used interactively until it is closed. We have never had a problem with this command running R on Windows XP machines.
>
> Recently a number of us have switched to PCs running Windows 7. Under this operating system the above command often, if not always, fails to open a window. Some people can successfully run the command in one R session but then fail to get a window if a second R session is started. Others cannot get a window to open at all. We've tested the command with R 2.12.1, 2.12.1 patched, 2.12.2 and 2.12.2 patched (all in both 32 and 64 bit). All of these exhibit the same problem.
>
> I raised the issue as a bug (https://bugs.r-project.org/bugzilla3/show_bug.cgi?id=14516), but this was promptly closed as being "not reproducible". Since we are having issues running the above command on all of our windows 7 PCs but none of our windows XP PCs, and since whoever closed the bug clearly had no issues running the command on his or her Windows 7 PC, I'm not really sure what to do next in terms of trying to resolve the problem.
>
> Can anyone shed any light on this issue? Is anyone able to reproduce it (only takes 30 seconds, just copy the above line into RGui on Windows 7 and confirm whether a command prompt opens; then, with the first session still open, try the same in a second RGui window)?
>
> Any help or feedback would be appreciated,
>
> Cheers,
>
> Ralph
>        [[alternative HTML version deleted]]
>
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-- 
Jim Holtman
Data Munger Guru

What is the problem that you are trying to solve?