[R-sig-Debian] [R-sig-debian] compiling from source

[Dirk Eddelbuettel]

On 7 October 2008 at 14:44, Vincent Goulet wrote:
| 
| Le mar. 7 oct. à 14:24, Sebastian P. Luque a écrit :
| 
| > On Tue, 7 Oct 2008 12:55:19 -0500,
| > "Erin Hodgess" <erinm.hodgess at gmail.com> wrote:
| >
| >> Hi R Debian People: I am aware that there are binaries for R for
| >> Debian.
| >
| >> Is it ever necessary to compile from source, or should I just leave
| >> well enough alone, please (high probability)?
| >
| >
| > Depends on how quickly you want the latest R and what Debian branch
| > you're using.  If you're using sid ("unstable"), i.e. you want to live
| > on Debian's bleeding edge (closest to upstream), updating very
| > frequently, and deal with "issues" from time to time, then I'd just  
| > use
| > the Debian packages (the maintainer, Dirk Eddelbuettel, keeps them
| > barely hours behind the upstream releases).  If you're using other
| > Debian branches, but still want to use the latest R, options get more
| > complicated.
| 
| I'd beg to differ, here. The "unstable" packages usually migrate to  
| "testing" after the latency period of ten days. As for "stable", the  

Unless Debian is 'about to release' which can take a while. In that case, you
can (more often than not) _install and use_ binaries from 'unstable' on
testing (and the exception happens when the core libs and compilers differ,
usually not for long).  That's advanced topic under the heading 'apt
pinning'; googeling for that term should reveal a few HOWTOs. For what it is
worth, that is what I do at home on Debian.

| binary packages are available from CRAN; see
| 
| 	http://cran.r-project.org/bin/linux/debian

Exactly. And the ones from stable should also run on testing.  

So to get back on topic re Erin's question. My take:   

	No, in general it is not worth rebuilding locally.

I.e. I am also using an Ubuntu box which gets new packages typically within a
day thanks to Vincent and Michael.

That said, we could do with a new (or at least backup) Debian volunteer given
that Johannes has moved on from Bremen.  Experience with pbuilder helpful,
but the crack crew is happy to teach that too. Some experience with Debian
tools definitely helps.

Dirk

-- 
Three out of two people have difficulties with fractions.