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

[Ben Bolker]

   Thanks for the tip, I'll take a look.

   Given that three relatively experienced package authors all seem to 
have experienced similar issues, it seems that maybe this is worth 
figuring out/maybe I'm not just doing something boneheaded.

   cheers
     Ben

On 10/7/20 8:31 PM, Duncan Murdoch wrote:
> 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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