[R-sig-Debian] Compiling an older version of R (2.11.1) on Ubuntu 13.10

[Dirk Eddelbuettel]

Hi Sam,

Always nice to email across town :)

On 9 June 2014 at 16:12, Samuel Bowerman wrote:
| Hello all,
| 
| I am trying to compile (by "hand") an old version of R (2.11.1,
| specifically). "Why?", you might ask. Well, I have a program I am trying to
| run (that was not written by me, but I am hoping to use in my research) that
| was written in "old" R, and the program writer has specifically mentioned
| that R-2.11.1 or older must be used. I have run "./configure" with no
| obvious errors (the entire output being far too long to post here, but I
| have been warned that I cannot make PDF, DVI, or html versions of the help
| pages, which I'm not too concerned about). Next, when I pass the "make"
| command, I am met with the following error (after a long stream of
| successful commands):
| 
|     Warning in solve.default(rgb):
| 
|     unable to load shared library
| '/home/sbowerma/Programs/R-2.11.1/modules//lapack.so':
| 
|     /home/sbowerma/Programs/R-2.11.1/lib/libRlapack.so: undefined symbol:
| _gfortran_compare_string
| 
|     Error in solve.default(rgb) : lapack routines cannot be loaded
| 
|     Error: unable to load R code in package 'grDevices'
| 
|     Execution halted
| 
| However, I have confirmed that the library "lapack.so" is, in fact, in the
| exact position it is supposed to be. If anyone has any suggestions or fixes,
| I would be most appreciative. Thanks.

You could try configuring with the external BLAS and LAPACK instead of using
R's own sources.

In general, maybe you safest bet is to a sufficient old version of Ubuntu and
run it in virtualization. Then the build environment will match more closely.
If you were to move your main Ubuntu to 14.04, then you could take advantage
of the (unbelievably awesome) docker.io that runs just outside the box:

edd at max:~$ docker.io images
REPOSITORY    TAG        IMAGE ID         CREATED     VIRTUAL SIZE
ubuntu        12.10      6006e6343fad     10 days ago     172.2 MB
ubuntu        quantal    6006e6343fad     10 days ago     172.2 MB
ubuntu        13.10      d2099a5ba6c5     10 days ago     180.2 MB
ubuntu        saucy      d2099a5ba6c5     10 days ago     180.2 MB
ubuntu        14.04      5cf8fd909c6c     10 days ago     274.3 MB
ubuntu        latest     5cf8fd909c6c     10 days ago     274.3 MB
ubuntu        trusty     5cf8fd909c6c     10 days ago     274.3 MB
ubuntu        13.04      7656cbf56a8c     10 days ago     169.4 MB
ubuntu        raring     7656cbf56a8c     10 days ago     169.4 MB
ubuntu        12.04      cc0067db4f11     10 days ago     210.1 MB
ubuntu        precise    cc0067db4f11     10 days ago     210.1 MB
ubuntu        10.04      3db9c44f4520     7 weeks ago     183 MB
ubuntu        lucid      3db9c44f4520     7 weeks ago     183 MB
edd at max:~$ 

Here I just followed the basic example steps to install the default ubuntu
images and in one command ended up with an almost half-decade suite from
10.04 to 14.04.

Dirk

-- 
http://dirk.eddelbuettel.com | @eddelbuettel | edd at debian.org