[R-pkg-devel] Warnings with reverse dependencies in mutually dependend packages?

[Duncan Murdoch]

On 25/08/2015 9:48 AM, Daniel Lüdecke wrote:
> I maintain two packages, which are kind of "mutually depending" on each 
> other. Now I have updated package A, like to submit it - however, it 
> produces warnings (in my package B) when doing the reverse dependency 
> check. Yet I cannot fix the warnings in package B and submit it, since 
> it relies on new functions of package A, which has to be submitted 
> first... and so on.
> 
> My question: is it ok to submit package A, saying that I'm aware of the 
> warnings in package B, which are already fixed, and that I would submit 
> package B after package A has been released on CRAN?


It's not clear to me whether both packages will work in the time when
you've updated A but not B.  If not, this is a bad idea:  users of your
packages will be left with broken systems.

If you want to make incompatible changes to A, and B is the only reverse
dependency, then you could update both at once.  When you submit the
first one, say that the other submission is coming as well.

You should also be making use of version specifiers in your DESCRIPTION
file.  If B version 2 won't work with A version 1, then say that, via

Depends:  A (>=2.0.0)

Duncan Murdoch