[R] Unable to Install a package from source in Windows

[Henrik Bengtsson]

On Thu, Jan 9, 2014 at 11:04 AM, Henrik Bengtsson <hb at biostat.ucsf.edu> wrote:
> The answer most likely is in the message:
>
> '\\homer.win.ad.jhu.edu\users$\rvaradh1\Documents'
> CMD.EXE was started with the above path as the current directory.
> UNC paths are not supported.  Defaulting to Windows directory.
>
> That path starting with a \\ is a *UNC path* (a Windows thing), which
> I believe install.packages() cannot install to.

Actually, that particular message appears because your *current
working directory* (getwd()) is a UNC path.  So, you must make sure to
call install.packages() with a "regular" working directory.  However,
even if you still do this, I believe install.packages() will give
another error related to the UNC path.

My $.02+$.02

/H

> If you look at the output of:
>
>> .libPaths()
>
> you'll probably find that the first entry contains the above path (I
> think).  I'm pretty sure there is a non-UNC path to your user home
> directory, e.g. "C:\Users\rvaradh1" or just "H:", but currently the
> system environment variable HOME points to
> '\\homer.win.ad.jhu.edu\users$\rvaradh1\", cf. Sys.getenv("HOME"),
> which is used by default to set .libPaths().  However, you can control
> it by setting R_LIBS or R_LIBS_USER to avoid a UNC path, cf
> ?.libPaths.  Also, you may want to tell your sysadm to change HOME to
> a non-UNC path (which is a bit odd).
>
> In the worst case scenario, you can try to map the UNC path to a drive
> letter and change .libPaths() accordingly, e.g.
>
> # Assuming the first lib path is the problematic one:
>> path <- .libPaths()[1]
> # Map to drive letter Z
>> system2("net", args=c("use", "Z:", path))
> # Update so that packages are installed to that directory
>> .libPaths("Z:/")
>
> Then retry to install...
>
> If you don't understand the above, talk to your sysadm.
>
> /Henrik
>
>
> On Thu, Jan 9, 2014 at 8:46 AM, Ravi Varadhan <ravi.varadhan at jhu.edu> wrote:
>> Hi,
>> I am using following R version:
>>> version
>>                _
>> platform       i386-w64-mingw32
>> arch           i386
>> os             mingw32
>> system         i386, mingw32
>> status
>> major          3
>> minor          0.1
>> year           2013
>> month          05
>> day            16
>> svn rev        62743
>> language       R
>> version.string R version 3.0.1 (2013-05-16)
>> nickname       Good Sport
>>>
>>
>> I was able to build the source of a package without any errors or warnings.  However, when I try to install the package, I get the following error messages.  Can someone point me to what I am doing wrong?
>>
>> Thanks in advance,
>> Ravi
>>
>>> install.packages("H:/Documents/computations/BB_2014.01-1.tar.gz", repos=NULL, type="source")
>> Installing package into '\\homer.win.ad.jhu.edu/users$/rvaradh1/Documents/R/win-library/3.0'
>> (as 'lib' is unspecified)
>> '\\homer.win.ad.jhu.edu\users$\rvaradh1\Documents'
>> CMD.EXE was started with the above path as the current directory.
>> UNC paths are not supported.  Defaulting to Windows directory.
>> * installing *source* package 'BB' ...
>> ** R
>> ** demo
>> ** inst
>> ** byte-compile and prepare package for lazy loading
>> ** help
>> *** installing help indices
>> ** building package indices
>> ** installing vignettes
>> ** testing if installed package can be loaded
>> *** arch - i386
>> Warning in library(pkg_name, lib.loc = lib, character.only = TRUE, logical.return = TRUE) :
>>   there is no package called 'BB'
>> Error: loading failed
>> Execution halted
>> *** arch - x64
>> Warning in library(pkg_name, lib.loc = lib, character.only = TRUE, logical.return = TRUE) :
>>   there is no package called 'BB'
>> Error: loading failed
>> Execution halted
>> ERROR: loading failed for 'i386', 'x64'
>> * removing '\\homer.win.ad.jhu.edu/users$/rvaradh1/Documents/R/win-library/3.0/BB'
>> * restoring previous '\\homer.win.ad.jhu.edu/users$/rvaradh1/Documents/R/win-library/3.0/BB'
>> Warning messages:
>> 1: running command '"C:/PROGRA~1/R/R-30~1.1/bin/i386/R" CMD INSTALL -l "\\homer.win.ad.jhu.edu\users$\rvaradh1\Documents\R\win-library\3.0" "H:/Documents/computations/BB_2014.01-1.tar.gz"' had status 1
>> 2: In install.packages("H:/Documents/computations/BB_2014.01-1.tar.gz",  :
>>   installation of package 'H:/Documents/computations/BB_2014.01-1.tar.gz' had non-zero exit status
>>>
>>
>>         [[alternative HTML version deleted]]
>>
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