[rkward-users] rkward - the R package, fails to install. A solution found.

[Prasenjit Kapat]

Hi,

Finally our dept moved to R 2.8 and I had to bite the bullet and
update rkward. I was seeing some comits in the svn tree, so I decided
to run the svn again. Since the office machine runs KDE 3.5.4 (RedHat
EL5), I tried out the release_branch_0.4.9.

Good news: Everything compiled fine.
Bad news (initially): rkward, the R package not as the KDE software,
did not install.

Looking through the "make install" log:

make[3]: Entering directory
`/scratch/pkapat/softwares/rkward_svn/rkward/rbackend/rpackages'
Makefile:656: warning: overriding commands for target `distclean'
Makefile:583: warning: ignoring old commands for target `distclean'
mkdir -p tmp ; \
        OLDTMP=$TMPDIR ; \
        export TMPDIR=`pwd`/tmp ; \
        mkdir -p //home/pkapat/R/i686-redhat-linux-gnu-library/2.8/ ; \
        /usr/lib/R/bin/R CMD INSTALL -l
//home/pkapat/R/i686-redhat-linux-gnu-library/2.8/ rkward ; \
        export TMPDIR=$OLDTMP
/usr/lib/R/bin/INSTALL: line 950: cd:
/scratch/pkapat/softwares/rkward_svn/rkward/rbackend/rpackages/rkward
/scratch/pkapat/softwares/rkward_svn/rkward/rbackend/rpackages/rkward:
No such file or directory
/bin/sed: can't read DESCRIPTION: No such file or directory
ERROR: no 'Package' field in 'DESCRIPTION'
/bin/sed: read error on
/scratch/pkapat/softwares/rkward_svn/rkward/rbackend/rpackages/rkward:
Is a directory
make[3]: Leaving directory
`/scratch/pkapat/softwares/rkward_svn/rkward/rbackend/rpackages'
make[3]: Entering directory
`/scratch/pkapat/softwares/rkward_svn/rkward/rbackend'

So, it seemes "R CMD INSTALL" bailed out. I tried it on the terminal directly:

$ /usr/lib/R/bin/R CMD INSTALL -d -l
//home/pkapat/R/i686-redhat-linux-gnu-library/2.8/ rkward

<similar error>

Directory specification was wrong with R CMD INSTALL. Couldn't figure
out much from /usr/lib/R/bin/INSTALL script. Line 950 was a cd
command, may be the argument spec was messed up somehow.

Good news: The following worked:

$ /usr/lib/R/bin/R CMD INSTALL -d -l
//home/pkapat/R/i686-redhat-linux-gnu-library/2.8/ ./rkward

Note the "./rkward" instead of "rkward" in the end.

Nothing has changed on the Rkward's end: the
rbackend/rpackages/Makefile.am file is same from the earlier released
0.4.9 : the last commit on it was on 30 Dec 07 by Thomas (#2289), and
the relevant line is:

        ${R_HOMEDIR}/bin/R CMD INSTALL -l $(DESTDIR)/$(R_LIBDIR) rkward ; \

So I guess R's implementation of "R CMD INSTALL" seems to have
changed. I'll try to investigate this further. But as of now, if
anyone needs to install the "updated" 0.4.9 version from svn code for
R 2.8.0, the above solution should work. Use it after "make install".

Didn't anyone face this earlier?

-- 
Prasenjit