[R-sig-Debian] Dependency failures on installing older R packages in Ubuntu

[Dirk Eddelbuettel]

On 17 March 2016 at 13:56, Alexey Zaharov wrote:
| On Tue, 23 Feb 2016 16:58:20 +0000, Jordan Dawe wrote:
| >>apt is telling you that is has 3.2.3. Why don't you not use it?
| >>
| >>We are volunteers. We do promise that you can install ANY combinations
| >>of ALL packages at ANY time.  We work hard to give you the current
| >>packages, reliably.

I was actually half-wrong here, see below.

| > We are operating an R server in a business production environment, and
| > thus we wish to maintain package stability.  I understand you are
| > volunteers, and thank you for your efforts.  Since the previous versions
| > of these packages are available on your repository, I mistakenly thought
| > you intended there to be backward compatibility.
| > 
| > Thank-you for your prompt response.
| > 
| > Jordan
|
| You can install R of the given version by installing only `r-base-
| core=3.1.3-1precise2`.
| 
| Example:
| 
| #---------------------------------------------------------
| $ sudo aptitude versions ^r-base-core$
| i   2.14.1-1                                                      precise
| ...
| p   3.1.3-1precise2                                               precise
| ...
| p   3.2.3-4precise0                                               precise
| 
| $ sudo aptitude install r-base-core=3.1.3-1precise2
| #---------------------------------------------------------
| 
| It will be sufficient to have R working. All further packages can be then 
| complied separately.

True, and good point.

Another useful thing to keep in mind is that e.g. Debian has its own
'wayback' machines and now archives packages.  So if you insist on 'partying
like its 1999' and want to maintain/reconstruct an environment exactly as it
was, this can be of help:

     http://snapshot.debian.org/

I am not sure if Ubuntu does though.

Dirk

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