[R-SIG-Mac] help: R on Mac's is "buggy", department reconsidering

[Matthew Keller]

I withdraw my question. Have read R Mac FAQ 4.8. Basically, we send
the crash.log to R-SIG-Mac at R-project.org

Matt

On Jan 31, 2008 11:05 AM, Matthew Keller <mckellercran at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> Rob - my experience is that the crashes have to do with graphics, but
> I am going to be more systematic about this henceforth.
>
> Stupid question: Simon, when you say to report the crash, how exactly
> do we do this? Is it written somewhere how to do this? If not, then
> where is the log and do we need to send you that via email or is
> automated somehow?
>
> Matt
>
>
>
> On Jan 31, 2008 11:00 AM, Rob Goedman <goedman at mac.com> wrote:
> > Matthew,
> >
> > Thanks for your input. As some others noted, we might need some more
> > input to really be able to work on this problem.
> >
> > I do know of a sure way to crash R.app (up to R-2.7-devel).
> >
> > Below very simple lattice graphics example will crash R.app after
> > switching to the display to full screen (green button) and back
> > once or sometimes several times.
> >
> > I have been caught by this problem while teaching/using R.
> >
> > Could that be a/the possible reason for the crashes? By the way,
> > if you manually enlarge/shrink the quartz() window the problem
> > (crash) does not occur. Simon and I have been aware of this
> > issue but have not been able to find the cause. As far as I
> > recall it has been there for about 2 years (in fact since the
> > last lattice upgrade) and for me was the main reason to switch
> > to using an external editor. Once I figured out it was the little
> > green button, I felt more confident showing the nice internal
> > editor features to new users.
> >
> > The updated graphics in R-2.7-devel does solve this issue,
> > but of course R-2.7 is still out some time and is not
> > of release quality yet.
> >
> > Rob
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > On Jan 31, 2008, at 8:40 AM, Matthew Keller wrote:
> >
>
> > > Hello all,
> > >
> > > I dread writing this because it may come across as being ungrateful to
> > > the hard work of those (esp. Simon Urbanek) who have made an otherwise
> > > fantastic R interface for the mac. Nevertheless...
> > >
> > > I do most of my work in R using Aquamacs and had, until recently,
> > > little interaction with the R Gui. People in my department (psychology
> > > at CU Boulder) are mainly mac users, and a few of us (including the
> > > chair and the statistics professors) are making a push to make our
> > > department an "R" department (such that it is the package taught to
> > > undergrads and grad students). I have been teaching a four week intro
> > > to the R language this semester to students, postdocs, and faculty,
> > > and the undergrad stats professors have taken the leap and are
> > > teaching R in the undergrad stats classes this semester. So far so
> > > good... but...
> > >
> > > There is beginning to be a backlash, not from what I had expected ("R
> > > is too user unfriendly"... this doesn't seem to come up!), but rather
> > > that R is "too buggy" and crashes too often. Since switching to the R
> > > Gui to teach this class, I myself have had R crash several times
> > > (previously a rare occurrence when I used Aquamacs). I cannot find a
> > > rhyme or reason to when it happens. The students/colleagues in my
> > > class who are mac users also complain about it (none of the windows
> > > users have). And this morning, an email went out from one of the
> > > undergrad stats teachers who said much the same thing (see his email
> > > below).
> > >
> > > Being one of the people who really pushed for this switch to R, I hate
> > > to see it go down in flames because of this. I have considered trying
> > > to teach using R via Aquamacs, but this presents its own set of
> > > difficulties.
> > >
> > > Does anyone out there who has experience with the R Gui for Macs have
> > > any suggestions re making it more stable? Are there steps we can take
> > > or advice we can give to students that would lessen the number of
> > > crashes we are experiencing? Might the crashes be due to the newness
> > > of the Leopard OS, etc?
> > >
> > > I apologize for breaking the listserve rules - I have not given a good
> > > explanation of the conditions under which these crashes occur. I could
> > > try to get the students to document exactly when they happen and send
> > > a summary back out to the list if this would be helpful.
> > >
> > > I really want this (our department's switch to R) to go through, but I
> > > am afraid the "bugginess of R" may be jeopardizing this. Any help
> > > would be most appreciated. And as I said before, thank you to the
> > > people who have selflessly spent their time making the R Gui - I
> > > wouldn't even know where to start! Best,
> > >
> > > Matt
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > <message from an undergrad stats prof here at CU> :
> > >
> > > In the labs for my course, the R GUI has been buggy - i.e. will
> > > crash at
> > > random times. I thought this had to do with using R Commander, but
> > > after
> > > looking into it further, it has nothing to do with R Commander -
> > > when I
> > > ran through some of the tutorial/homework for my course using the R
> > > GUI
> > > (rather than R Commander) the crashes were still there.  I also
> > > thought
> > > it might have to do with computing labs (perhaps installing ALL R
> > > packages created the problem), but a quick survey in my course
> > > suggested
> > > that people's personal apple computers are experiencing the same
> > > thing.
> > > Greg and Matt Keller also mentioned to me that some of their students
> > > were having issues with the R GUI on Mac OS X. As everyone knows,
> > > there
> > > are A LOT of Mac users in the undergrad student body.
> > >
> > > As far as I can tell (after discussing with Matt Keller), it has
> > > nothing
> > > to do with the R "engine" - it's all about the R GUI interface (for
> > > example, I've never had a problem submitting R jobs in pseudo-batch
> > > mode).  I get slightly less buggy-ness on my Mac (intel dual-core,
> > > Leopard), but there are still some issues.
> > >
> > > Anyway, no real action items here other than to note that it appears
> > > to
> > > be fairly common. The students are tolerating it, and I just keep
> > > telling them that it's "free" and "free" always comes at a price. If
> > > anyone has stumbled a more stable configuration, please let me know!
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > --
> > > Matthew C Keller
> > > Asst. Professor of Psychology
> > > University of Colorado at Boulder
> > > www.matthewckeller.com
> > >
> > > _______________________________________________
> > > R-SIG-Mac mailing list
> > > R-SIG-Mac at stat.math.ethz.ch
> > > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-sig-mac
> >
> >
> >
>
>
>
>
> --
> Matthew C Keller
> Asst. Professor of Psychology
> University of Colorado at Boulder
> www.matthewckeller.com
>



-- 
Matthew C Keller
Asst. Professor of Psychology
University of Colorado at Boulder
www.matthewckeller.com