[R-sig-Debian] Poll: Does R_PAPERSIZE in /etc/R/Renviron matter?

[Dirk Eddelbuettel]

On 23 October 2006 at 15:36, Dirk Eddelbuettel wrote:
| 
| A heuristic runs via the r-base-core package postinst. It is intended
| to use the result from Debian's paperconf(1) toool, and to update the R
| environment variable R_PAPERSIZE accordingly.  This apparently broke some
| time ago when R changed to a dual variable setup, and my regexp didn't
| notice. 
| 
| Does anybody use this, or is it ok if I simply disable this in Debian?  In
| that case we simply do what everybody else does, so you all get to live by
| the 'letter' setting that comes from my compile-time choice.  It is easy
| enough to override either in /etc/R/Renviron or in ~/.Renviron.
| 
| Opinions either way? Let me know. For now, I intend to simply comment this
| out in the next release (presumably a rc for 2.4.1).

My thanks to those who answered already. For those who are perplexed, I
should have add the following few paragraphs.

Run

	$ echo 'print(options("papersize"))' | R --slave

to see your current setting. 

R 2.4.0 has a new heuristic based on the locale:

	The way option("papersize") is set has been changed.  On
	platforms which support the LC_PAPER locale category, the
	setting is taken first from the R_PAPERSIZE environment
	variable at run time, then from the LC_PAPER category
	("letter" for _US and _CA locales and "a4" otherwise).	On
	other platforms (including Windows and older Unixen), the
	choice is unchanged.

which should get it right for most people.  If not, the easiest per-user
override is in ~/.Renviron, and system-wide could be done in
/etc/R/Renviron. 

Thanks, Dirk

-- 
Hell, there are no rules here - we're trying to accomplish something. 
                                                  -- Thomas A. Edison