[R-sig-Debian] arm64 r-base backports on CRAN

[Dirk Eddelbuettel]

On 24 June 2025 at 15:41, Jeroen Ooms wrote:
| Would it be possible to add arm64 binaries for the r-base backports on
| https://cran.r-project.org/bin/linux/debian and/or perhaps update the
| readme a bit about what is available?

That part is maintained by Johanned so you need to talk to him.
 
| Afaict, the deb repos on CRAN currently host arm64 binaries for
| ubuntu-22.04 / 24.04, however not for ubuntu-20.04 and also not for

Because launchpad.net, where Michael builds these, supports arm64 for those
two releases.

20.04 is old, the official support is five years so it is pretty much EOL.

| Debian 10/11/12.

There are not (publically accessible) builder farms I am aware of.
 
| Having the installers there will make it easier for users on arm64
| hardware (or GHA) to check their packages on Debian.

For all practical matters Ubuntu is 'close enough' -- and for Ubuntu we have
r2u which supports

  i)  amd64 and arm64 for the main R package(s) at CRAN,
  ii) as well as over 22k CRAN binaries via the r2u apt repo

making it much easier to test with whatever (CRAN) dependencies a package may
have.  This works most easily via a container, via GitHub Actions (given GH
has Ubuntu runners) or of course via direct installation.

To be clear, I fully agree with your "wouldn't it be nice if ..." sentiment
but at the end of the day a volunteer has to step up. If you see something
missing, could you supply it, possibly in coordination with the maintainer of
the existing service?

Cheers, Dirk


-- 
dirk.eddelbuettel.com | @eddelbuettel | edd using debian.org