[R-pkg-devel] Wrong mailing list: Could the 100 byte path length limit be lifted?

[McGrath, Justin M]

On Windows, packages will be in "C:\Users\[User Name]\Documents\R\win-library\[R version]\[Package Name]".

With a 150 byte limit, that leaves 70 bytes for the user name, R version and package name. That seems more than sufficient. If people are downloading the source files, that also leaves plenty of space regardless where they choose to extract the files.

________________________________________
From: Dirk Eddelbuettel <edd using debian.org>
Sent: Wednesday, December 13, 2023 9:13 AM
To: Tomas Kalibera
Cc: Dirk Eddelbuettel; McGrath, Justin M; Ben Bolker; Martin Maechler; r-package-devel using r-project.org
Subject: Re: [R-pkg-devel] Wrong mailing list: Could the 100 byte path length limit be lifted?


On 13 December 2023 at 16:02, Tomas Kalibera wrote:
|
| On 12/13/23 15:59, Dirk Eddelbuettel wrote:
| > On 13 December 2023 at 15:32, Tomas Kalibera wrote:
| > | Please don't forget about what has been correctly mentioned on this
| > | thread already: there is essentially a 260 character limit on Windows
| > | (see
| > | https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://blog.r-project.org/2023/03/07/path-length-limit-on-windows/index.html__;!!DZ3fjg!-NHAlEZQvY2kegkNVkuY3Lf84nKmMahrpZ4Euz2XXFDPvMWEcP28iepLlRiKzVZdAh752lyhHxd6zvk$
| > | for more). Even if the relative path length limit for a CRAN package was
| > | no longer regarded important for tar compatibility, it would still make
| > | sense for compatibility with Windows. It may still be a good service to
| > | your users if you keep renaming the files to fit into that limit.
| >
| > So can lift the limit from 100 char to 260 char ?
|
| The 260 char limit is for the full path. A package would be extracted in
| some directory, possibly also with a rather long name.

Call a cutoff number.

Any move from '100' to '100 + N' for any nonzero N is a win. Pick one, and
then commit the change.  N = 50 would be a great start as arbitrary as it is.

Dirk

--
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