[R] update.packages() fails due to searching for old versions of packages

[Michael McQuaid]

Thanks. I'm no longer seeing the error using the utk mirror.

- Mick


On Mon, Dec 22, 2025 at 3:56 AM Duncan Murdoch <murdoch.duncan using gmail.com>
wrote:

> This was a problem on the CRAN macOS site.  Once Simon was informed
> about it, he fixed it.  I tested e1071 and it's fine for me, but he said
> some mirrors may take a while to catch up, so if you still see the
> error, try the https://mac.r-project.org mirror.
>
> Duncan Murdoch
>
>
> On 2025-12-21 5:11 a.m., Duncan Murdoch wrote:
> > I see the same thing in R 4.5.2 on MacOS Sequoia 15.7.2.  The problem
> > happens in install.packages() as well, e.g. I get the same error with
> >
> >     install.packages("e1071")
> >
> > A workaround is to ask for `type="source"`, as long as you're prepared
> > to recompile the new package.
> >
> > I think the issue is that there is no binary available for the latest
> > 1.7-17 version.  The database says the binary for 1.7-16 is available,
> > but in fact it is not.
> >
> > Duncan Murdoch
> >
> > On 2025-12-20 2:30 p.m., Michael McQuaid wrote:
> >> When I try to update packages, the package manager appears to search for
> >> old versions of the packages, despite seemingly knowing about the
> existence
> >> of newer versions. Here is an example where I try to update the e1071
> >> package and it seems to recognize that the current version is 1.7-17 but
> >> then searches for and fails to find 1.7-16. This happens for every
> package
> >> I try to update, I've just included one here for brevity. I have tried
> >> several mirrors including wustl, utk, and iastate. I wonder if there is
> >> some file on my system pointing to the old version. I also tried
> updating
> >> from R 4.5.1 to 4.5.2, but the issue persists. I am on macOS Tahoe 26.2
> on
> >> an M1 Macbook Pro.
> >>
> >> $ Rscript -e 'update.packages(oldPkgs=c("e1071"))'
> >> e1071 :
> >>    Version 1.7-16 installed in
> /Users/mm223266/Library/R/arm64/4.5/library
> >>    Version 1.7-17 available at https://cloud.r-project.org
> >> Update? (Yes/no/cancel)
> >> trying URL '
> >>
> https://cloud.r-project.org/bin/macosx/big-sur-arm64/contrib/4.5/e1071_1.7-16.tgz
> >> '
> >> Error in download.file(urls, destfiles, "libcurl", mode = "wb", ...) :
> >>     cannot open URL '
> >>
> https://cloud.r-project.org/bin/macosx/big-sur-arm64/contrib/4.5/e1071_1.7-16.tgz
> >> '
> >> In addition: Warning messages:
> >> 1: In download.file(urls, destfiles, "libcurl", mode = "wb", ...) :
> >>     downloaded length 0 != reported length 279
> >> 2: In download.file(urls, destfiles, "libcurl", mode = "wb", ...) :
> >>     cannot open URL '
> >>
> https://cloud.r-project.org/bin/macosx/big-sur-arm64/contrib/4.5/e1071_1.7-16.tgz
> ':
> >> HTTP status was '404 Not Found'
> >> Warning in download.packages(pkgs, destdir = tmpd, available =
> available,  :
> >>     download of package ‘e1071’ failed
> >>
> >>      [[alternative HTML version deleted]]
> >>
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> >
>
>

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