[R-SIG-Mac] 2.10.0 beta help functions

[Prof Brian Ripley]

On Thu, 15 Oct 2009, Simon Urbanek wrote:

>
> On Oct 15, 2009, at 16:01 , Prof Brian Ripley wrote:
>
>> Hmm, I think you probably have pre-built html pages.
>
> Yes, that's likely. They used to be part of the installation but now are not. 
> The fact that they are missing was useful to point out that I forgot to 
> switch R.app from html to dynamic help (fixed now), but I was actually 
> planning on keeping them installed for other software that relies on it (e.g. 
> JGR). That will give those packages the chance to update until R 2.11.0.

I am sure Simon knows this, but they are still optional (configure 
option --enable-prebuilt-html).  More seriously, they are pretty much 
untested and I've fixed a couple of non-trivial bugs today (so the 
HTML files need to be regenerated).

Also, I've just updated my checkout of the Mac-GUI project and rebuilt 
it, and whereas help() now works with dynamic help, help.search() 
still fails to find pages for packages not under the main library tree 
(print.hsearch in the Mac-GUI project needs updating).

It's your prerogative to ship prebuilt HTML pages, but they are not 
going to be shipped on Windows, and not AFAIK on Linux binary builds, 
so a fair proportion of JGR users will want an update anyway.  They 
just add to the size of the download and the vast majority of users 
will never access them.

Brian

>
> Thanks,
> Simon
>
>
>> I simply don't see any code that will generate them, either directly or by 
>> starting the httpd server to do so.
>> 
>> I just did some quick experiments, and I get blank pages on packages 
>> without pre-built html, and correct ones on a package I just installed with 
>> 'R CMD INSTALL --html'.
>> 
>> On Thu, 15 Oct 2009, Rob Goedman wrote:
>> 
>>> Peter,
>>> 
>>> On my system (SnowLeopard, below R builds) I did see the warning
>>> messages (but the internal help worked fine).
>>> 
>>> This morning I changed the htmlhelp settings as suggested by the
>>> warning message ( help_type ='html' ) in main.m and rebuild R.app. The
>>> warnings are gone and help still works.
>>> 
>>> Rob
>>> 
>>> -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>> 
>>> 
>>> R version 2.10.0 beta (2009-10-15 r50083)
>>> Copyright (C) 2009 The R Foundation for Statistical Computing
>>> ISBN 3-900051-07-0
>>> 
>>> ...
>>> 
>>> [R.app GUI 1.30 (5495) x86_64-apple-darwin9.8.0]
>>> 
>>> [Workspace restored from /Users/rob/Projects/.RData]
>>> 
>>>> ?ls
>>> Warning message:
>>> In help("ls", package = NULL) :
>>> htmhelp = TRUE is deprecated: use help_type ="html"
>>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> On Oct 14, 2009, at 6:42 PM, Simon Urbanek wrote:
>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> On Oct 14, 2009, at 7:19 PM, Peter Cowan wrote:
>>>> 
>>>>> I just installed the nightly from r.research.att.com called "R 2.10.0
>>>>> beta (2009-10-13)" for leopard using the pkg installer.
>>>>> 
>>>>> When I use ?plot or help(plot) the help window opens, but is blank.
>>>>> And, I get this warning:
>>>>> 
>>>>>> ?plot
>>>>> Warning message:
>>>>> In help("plot", package = NULL) :
>>>>> htmhelp = TRUE is deprecated: use help_type ="html"
>>>>> 
>>>>> I know the help system has changed significantly in 2.10.0 and I
>>>>> apologize if it is poor form to report errors such as this while the
>>>>> still in the beta phase,
>>>> 
>>>> To the contrary! The whole point of the beta phase is that it gets
>>>> tested and all errors reported -- I'll look into this, thanks for
>>>> the report.
>>>> 
>>>> Cheers,
>>>> Simon
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>>> but my reliance on these help functions has
>>>>> prevented me from continuing to use the beta and test other changes.
>>>>> 
>>>>> BTW thank you for the option, in the new installer, to only install
>>>>> the 64bit GUI version.
>>>>> 
>>>>> Thank you,
>>>>> 
>>>>> Peter
>>>>> 
>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>> R-SIG-Mac mailing list
>>>>> R-SIG-Mac at stat.math.ethz.ch
>>>>> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-sig-mac
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>> 
>>>
>>> 	[[alternative HTML version deleted]]
>>> 
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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
>> 
>

-- 
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