[R-pkg-devel] is R CMD build --compact-vignettes working as expected?

[Duncan Murdoch]

I don't know the answer to your question, but you can debug the 
--compact-vignettes option as follows.

debug(tools::compactPDF)
tools:::.build_packages(c("--compact-vignettes", "pkgdir"))

where "pkgdir" is the directory of the source of your package.  Add 
extra options to the build as separate elements of the argument to 
.build():  this function is called after args have been parsed.

When I do that, I see that it rejects the compaction, because none of 
mine benefit much from it:  it wants at least a 10% and 10K reduction. 
But Ben's example met those criteria.  When I trick it into accepting 
the compaction, it does put the compacted PDF into the tarball.

Duncan Murdoch

On 07/10/2020 6:03 p.m., John Fox wrote:
> Dear Ben,
> 
> On 2020-10-07 5:26 p.m., Ben Bolker wrote:
>>     I hope so too. The (annoying) workaround is to compact the vignette
>> yourself (using qpdf directly or using tools::compactPDF), then use
>> no-build-vignettes.  The problem there is whatever's supposed to happen
>> with building vignette indices.  The uuuuugly workaround, I guess, is to
>> build the tarball, compact the vignettes oneself, then *replace* them in
>> the tarball.  (Obviously I can automate that, but it seems as though it
>> would be unnecessary if I knew what was going on ...)
> 
> I've used both of these workarounds and agree that it would be nice to
> avoid them. After all, what is the --compact-vignettes argument for?
> 
> Best,
>    John
> 
>>
>>     cheers
>>      Ben
>>
>>
>> On 10/7/20 4:10 PM, John Fox wrote:
>>> Dear Ben,
>>>
>>> I was hoping that someone would pick up on this problem, because I've
>>> experienced the same issue of --compact-vignettes apparently ignored,
>>> e.g., with the Rcmdr package under R 4.0.2 on both macOS and Windows.
>>>
>>> Best,
>>>    John
>>>
>>> John Fox, Professor Emeritus
>>> McMaster University
>>> Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
>>> web: https://socialsciences.mcmaster.ca/jfox/
>>>
>>> On 2020-10-05 1:09 p.m., Ben Bolker wrote:
>>>>     Am I confused, or doing something wrong, or ... ?
>>>>
>>>>     I have qpdf installed, and am running R CMD build with
>>>> --compact-vignettes, but the PDF in the tarball doesn't seem to be
>>>> compressed despite the fact that the output messages say "compacting
>>>> vignettes ..."
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>     $ R CMD build --compact-vignettes lme4
>>>> * checking for file ‘lme4/DESCRIPTION’ ... OK
>>>> * preparing ‘lme4’:
>>>> * checking DESCRIPTION meta-information ... OK
>>>> * cleaning src
>>>> * installing the package to process help pages
>>>> * saving partial Rd database
>>>> * creating vignettes ... OK
>>>> Warning: ‘inst/doc’ files
>>>>       ‘lmerperf.html’, ‘lmer.pdf’, ‘PLSvGLS.pdf’, ‘Theory.pdf’
>>>>     ignored as vignettes have been rebuilt.
>>>>     Run R CMD build with --no-build-vignettes to prevent rebuilding.
>>>> * compacting vignettes and other PDF files
>>>> * cleaning src
>>>> * checking for LF line-endings in source and make files and shell
>>>> scripts
>>>> * checking for empty or unneeded directories
>>>> * building ‘lme4_1.1-24.tar.gz’
>>>>
>>>>     The copy of lmer.pdf in the resulting tarball is 900K or so:
>>>>
>>>> $ tar ztvf lme4_1.1-24.tar.gz lme4/inst/doc/lmer.pdf
>>>> -rw-r--r-- bolker/bolker 907022 2020-10-05 12:59 lme4/inst/doc/lmer.pdf
>>>>
>>>>     The previously built (and manually compacted) version of lmer.pdf
>>>> in the tarball is 500K:
>>>>
>>>> $ ls -l lme4/inst/doc/lmer.pdf
>>>> -rw-r--r-- 1 bolker bolker 495199 Oct  3 22:15 lme4/inst/doc/lmer.pdf
>>>>
>>>>      Is 'R CMD build' confused by the presence of a pre-built PDF in
>>>> the inst/doc directory? Or am I somehow mistaken about how this is
>>>> supposed to work?
>>>>
>>>>      I would just use --no-build-vignettes and submit the tarball with
>>>> the previously built/compressed PDF, but I'm trying to avoid a
>>>> "Package has a VignetteBuilder field but no prebuilt vignette index"
>>>> NOTE, which I assume is missing because I built without building
>>>> vignettes ... ?
>>>>
>>>>     As always, enlightenment is welcome.
>>>>
>>>>     cheers
>>>>       Ben Bolker
>>>>
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> 
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