[R-pkg-devel] COMPILED_BY vs. R_COMPILED_BY

[William Dunlap]

Is there rational for COMPILED_BY (a make variable on Windows) and
R_COMPILED_BY (an environment variable on Windows) differing?

> system(intern=TRUE, paste(file.path(R.home("bin"), "R"), "CMD config
COMPILED_BY"))
[1] "gcc-4.9.3"
> Sys.getenv("R_COMPILED_BY")
[1] "gcc 4.9.3"

The NEWS file for R-3.3.0 says that R_COMPILED_BY is intended to be for
transition purposes but a fair number of packages use it.  Will it go away
soon?

  • (Windows) R is now built using gcc 4.9.3. This build will require
recompilation of at least those packages that include C++ code, and
possibly others. A build of R-devel using the older toolchain will be
temporarily available for comparison purposes. During the transition, the
environment variable R_COMPILED_BY has been defined to indicate which
toolchain was used to compile R (and hence, which should be used to compile
code in packages). The COMPILED_BY variable described below will be a
permanent replacement for this.
• (Windows) A make and R CMD config variable named COMPILED_BY has been
added. This indicates which toolchain was used to compile R (and hence,
which should be used to compile code in packages).

Bill Dunlap
TIBCO Software
wdunlap tibco.com

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