[R-pkg-devel] The Help (e.g. links) is not working for my packages

[David.Kaethner at dlr.de]

Hello,

for the archive: I believe I found the solution, validated on Win7 and MacOS.

This error occurs for any package that starts with "help". So "hell" is ok, "help12345" is not ok as a package name.

Is this documented behavior? Apologies if I missed that.


-----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
Von: Duncan Murdoch [mailto:murdoch.duncan at gmail.com] 
Gesendet: Mittwoch, 9. August 2017 14:39
An: Käthner, David; r-package-devel at r-project.org
Betreff: Re: [R-pkg-devel] The Help (e.g. links) is not working for my packages

On 07/08/2017 3:41 AM, David.Kaethner at dlr.de wrote:
> Hello,
>
>
>
> I am hoping to post to the right mailing list, if not apologies!
>
>
>
> I have recently written my first couple packages, relying on devtools and roxygen. Everything is done in RStudio (details regarding the setup: see end of text).
>
>
>
> But the help is not working! Specifically:
>
>
>
> On Windows 7:
>
> * functions: I cannot click the links in the 'help'-panel. Or at least nothing happens when I click them.
>
> * DESCRIPTION: If I build the package locally, it has the same issues as the packages. If I install the packages from Github (devtools::install_github) or from a network drive, it works.
>
> * The "my_package::my_function" syntax throws an error. Once I enter 'my_package::' and click TAB, the following error appears in the console: "Error in gzfile(file, "rb") : cannot open the connection"
>
> * "?my_package::my_function" brings me to the function overview page 
> for the package, but not to the help page for the my_function()
>
> * the link itself (on the function overview page) looks inocuous: 
> http://127.0.0.1:44391/help/library/helpers/html/my_function.html
>
>
>
> I would love to do a Traceback on this, but I do not know how, since it only happens when hitting TAB. I have done a Traceback for "?my_package::my_function", it just returns the path to where the help should be, like "D:/Home/R/Rpackages/my_package/help/my_function".
>
>
>
> On MacOS Sierra:
>
> * DESCRIPTION can always be opened, no matter how the package is 
> installed
>
> * when clicking on functions in the help panel, the known error appears (as text in the help panel): "Error in gzfile(file, "rb") : cannot open the connection"
>
>
>
> It gets much weirder: When installing the package for the very first time, it seems to work! But after that it quits working, even not when I delete the package, re-install R, re-install RStudio, and create the package from scratch.
>
>
>
> I really wish I was kidding with all of this. I have tried every debugging-idea that came to my mind, including (but not limited to):
>
> * the .Rd-files are generated, they definitely are not missing
>
> * taking an auto-generated DESCRIPTION file
>
> * removing every function file save for a test file
>
> * copying content from a function file into the auto-generated 
> "hello.R" file
>
> * changing the encoding from UTF-8 to WINDOWS-1252
>
> * as mentioned, trying everying both on Windows and MacOS, and trying 
> different ways of installation
>
> * as mentioned, re-installing both R and RStudio
>
>
>
> I would enormously appreciate it if anyone has an idea how to get a handle on this, any suggestions are welcome!

Nothing that you've written is reproducible by others.  See if you can put together a short self-contained series of instructions that display the problems (or just one of them).  It might involve installing from Github, or making a package tarball available somewhere.

Duncan Murdoch