[R-SIG-Mac] html help and browser vs. Rgui

[Simon Urbanek]

Carl,

On Dec 9, 2010, at 5:53 PM, Carl Witthoft wrote:

> I have two separate questions about help windows.
> 
> First:  I'm running R2.12 at home under 10.5.8, and at work under 10.6.4 (Intel iMacs in both cases).
> 
> At home, when I invoke help, e.g.,
> >  ?sin ,
> I get the help page in the Rgui help window (and my web browser is not called).
> 
> But at work, the Rgui help window opens, remains blank, and the sin help page shows up in my default web browser.
> 
> Is there a way I can either force my work machine to use the Rgui window, or at the least stop the useless help window from opening up?
> 

The default is what you see at home - and that is the intended behavior.

There is a preference "use.external.help" that allows you to use an external browser (at the request of some users) - you can enable it using (in Terminal):
defaults write org.R-project.R use.external.help YES

and disable it using
defaults delete org.R-project.R use.external.help 

So chances are that you enabled it at some point in the past (maybe?) - it's definitely NOT the default.

Alternatively (if that's not the issue?) it may be some strange setting of your browser - but you'd have to provide more detains on that (e.g. do you use a custom browser instead of Safari which may be forcing that behavior?).

Cheers,
Simon



> Am I able to use the Rgui help window at home just thru some luck of pre-existing conditions (from the  R 2.8 or 2.9 days)?
> 
> I checked, and the Library/Frameworks/.../base/R/Rprofile files are the same on both machines, as are my personal   .Rprofile and .Renvir files in my home directory.
> 
> 
> Second: I noticed that on both machines, when I use the Search bar in the document editor window (Rgui editor window),  the little pop-up results panel displays the help page, with properly functioning links to referenced help pages.  This suggests the help system is working "behind the scenes" somehow on my work machine, even though it fails to access the Rgui Help window.    Anything I can do to adjust this?
> 
> 
> Many thanks for your help.
> 
> 
> Carl
> 
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