[R-SIG-Mac] Question Regarding R, Mac OS X, and Proxy Servers:

[Prof Brian Ripley]

On Thu, 1 May 2008, Simon Urbanek wrote:

> Dan,
>
> R is using its own cross-platform code for HTTP/FTP connections and relies on 
> the usual http_proxy env variable. Hence your best bet is to set http_proxy 
> in .Rprofile as Kasper suggested.

Or (see ?Startup), the environment setting files .Renviron and 
Renviron.site.

>
> Determining proxy settings from the preferences is very messy and unreliable 
> (due to PAC proxies), so the only alternative would be to use Apple's CF 
> network API for downloads. Given that it only adds complexity (event loop 
> issues etc.) with no obvious functional benefit it is questionable whether 
> it's worth the hassle.
>
> Cheers,
> Simon
>
>
> On May 1, 2008, at 11:47 AM, Stranathan, Dan wrote:
>
>> Hello everyone
>> 
>> I have a R question for you. I am new to the wide world of all things R and 
>> I am not a scientist or a programmer per se. I'm a Systems Administrator 
>> trying to troubleshoot a network issue with R - Specifically related to 
>> proxy servers.
>> 
>> Background:
>> My Institute has a Linus-based Squid proxy server that brokers all http 
>> traffic through it. We have 2 versions of the proxy server. One proxy 
>> server (used for 99% of our staff) requires the user to manually type a 
>> password when prompted. Not all applications are "smart" enough to 
>> understand a proxy can since it requires the 2-way process of password 
>> negotiation, etc. Our 2nd Proxy server is basically a "wide open door" to 
>> the Internet. Only certain managers and the IT dept are allowed to use this 
>> proxy. It doesn't require a password at all.
>> 
>> As you may know, the main way to configure proxy settings in OS X is via 
>> the System Preferences (the Network Pane has a tab for proxy settings). You 
>> can also configure these settings from the Terminal via the networksetup 
>> and systemsetup commands too. Both ways achieve the same result. You can 
>> also configure your shell session to be "proxy-aware" using the UNIX 
>> http_proxy variable in your .bash_profile (I describe this more below)
>> 
>> So far, both Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger) and 10.5 (Leopard) have worked quite 
>> well with our proxy servers. In fact, all "proxy aware" applications such 
>> as Safari, iTunes, WebDAV, etc work great (As long as you know your 
>> password of course). Even the curl and wget  commands work from the 
>> Terminal with once the proper configurations have been made.
>> 
>> My R Problem:
>> The GUI version of R 2.7.0 (and possibly earlier versions?) does not work 
>> with our proxy server correctly. I have tried both of our proxy servers 
>> (secure and open) and neither one will allow R to route out to the 
>> Internet. Other apps like Safari, curl, etc have no problem getting to the 
>> R update site (cran.r-project.org).
>> 
>> Certain command line tools will not honor the Mac OS X global proxy 
>> settings. When this happens I usually just add an environmental proxy 
>> setting with the "export http_proxy=<my proxy server>" to my .bash_profile, 
>> etc and I can get around this problem quite easily. I stumbled across this 
>> because the R command line tools (in Terminal and X11) were not honoring 
>> the Mac OS X global proxy settings at first, so I had to implement the 
>> setting I just described. It works great now. But... I still cant get the R 
>> GUI app to peacefully co-exist with my proxy servers, regardless of how I 
>> configure the Mac OS X GUI system proxy or the shell environment. Here is 
>> the error I get in the R GUI window:
>> 
>> Error in file(con, "r") : cannot open the connection
>> In addition: Warning message:
>> In file(con, "r") : unable to connect to 'cran.r-project.org' on port 80.
>>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> If you can offer any suggestions I would greatly appreciate them!
>> 
>> 
>> Thanks!
>> 
>> -Dan
>> 
>> _______________________________________________
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>> 
>> 
>
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-- 
Brian D. Ripley,                  ripley at stats.ox.ac.uk
Professor of Applied Statistics,  http://www.stats.ox.ac.uk/~ripley/
University of Oxford,             Tel:  +44 1865 272861 (self)
1 South Parks Road,                     +44 1865 272866 (PA)
Oxford OX1 3TG, UK                Fax:  +44 1865 272595