[R-pkg-devel] "no prebuilt vignette index" error

[Daniel Kelley]

QUESTION:

I wonder how to address the error that I’ve quoted in the subject line?


DETAILS:

I am using R 3.4.1 to build the “oce” package, which helps with the analysis of oceanographic data.  It’s several years old.

Lately, when I submit the “oce” package to winbuilder using

	devtools:build_win(version=“R-devel")

the message

	Package has a VignetteBuilder field but no prebuilt vignette index.

is issued. I do not get this message with

	devtools::build_win(version="R-release")

Using

	rhub::check_for_cran()

I find that message for some machines, but not all of them.

My DESCRIPTION (https://github.com/dankelley/oce/blob/develop/DESCRIPTION) has

	VignetteBuilder: knitr

and also

	Suggests: knitr, rmarkdown

(amongst other suggestions).  The file (https://raw.githubusercontent.com/dankelley/oce/develop/vignettes/oce.Rmd)

	vignettes/oce.Rnw

has YAML

	---
	title: "Oce"
	author: "Dan Kelley and Clark Richards"
	date: "`r Sys.Date()`"
	output:
	  rmarkdown::html_vignette:
	    fig_caption: yes
	vignette: >
	  %\VignetteIndexEntry{Oce}
	  %\VignetteEngine{knitr::rmarkdown}
	  \usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}
	—

and in this YAML sequence, I’ve also tried replacing the second-last line with

	%\VignetteEncoding{UTF-8}

I downloaded R 3.4.1 and see at lie 6703 of

	src/library/tools/R/QC.R

that R wants to find a file named

	build/vignette.rds

and (sure enough) that file is not in the tarball that is created with

	R CMD BUILD oce

at the commandline, or with

	devtools::build()

from within Rstudio.  As an aside, the latter issues a warning 

	Warning in tools:::.build_packages() :
	  invalid value for '--compact-vignettes', assuming “qpdf"

I’m not sure how to proceed to solve the problem I state in the second sentence of this email. And I’m not even positive that it *is* a problem, since it does not occur on all test systems.

Does anyone have any advice for further tests?

I’m sorry this email is very long — I tried to be quite clear.



SIGNATURE:


Dan E. Kelley, Professor
Oceanography Department, Dalhousie University
PO BOX 15000
Halifax, NS, Canada
B3H 4R2
Dan.Kelley at Dal.CA