[R-SIG-Mac] R on Mac: framework or homebrew?

[MacQueen, Don]

I've been using R on OS X probably ever since there was an R on OS X, and
like you I use it from the command line. In the early days I installed R
from sources, but quite a few years ago I switched to using the framework
version. I can't think of any disadvantage I've encountered.

If I were to not use the framework version, I think I would prefer to
install directly from sources, not use a package management system. There
might be more initial work installing various prerequisites (things like
tcl/tk, png, maybe readline, who knows what all) but it would probably be
better in the long run.

Some packages, such as a number of spatial packages, require installing
other libraries such as rgdal, proj, and others. Currently, these are also
available as frameworks, and installing those packages in a framework R is
now well-supported. It might be considerably more difficult to install
such packages in a non-framework R. I don't know how much would be
involved, so I just suggest it as an aspect to consider.

-Don

-- 
Don MacQueen

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
7000 East Ave., L-627
Livermore, CA 94550
925-423-1062





On 9/12/13 7:20 AM, "Rainer M Krug" <Rainer at krugs.de> wrote:

>Hi
>
>I am using R at the moment installed from the official installation as a
>framework, buit I also installed it from homebrew. As I am not using the
>Mac GUI (I am using mainly emacs, a little bit RStudio), so from there
>there was no difference.
>
>So which approach has which advantages? I can think of advantages when
>using homebrew (updates and upgrades of R) and also the framework
>approach (Ease of maintenance).
>
>I personaly lean towards the homebrew installation (linux background),
>but are there any disadvantages to using the official framework
>installation?
>
>Any comments?
>
>Cheers,
>
>Rainer
>
>-- 
>Rainer M. Krug
>
>email: RMKrug<at>gmail<dot>com