[BioC] error in getBioC("exprs")

[Jeff Gentry]

> While you are at it, can you please allow people to install R without 
> being root?  Our sysadmin will install only RPMs and since bioconductor 

Considering that I'm not a member of R-core, there's not a whole lot I can
do to R "while I'm at it".  You don't have to be root to install R.

> has no RPMS, all of the R users need  to compile the source for R.

That's what I do.

> It is a real pain and many long time R users are frustrated by it.  What 
> do you guys have to do something special? Every other unix app in the 
> world has an RPM.

Are you confusing R and Bioconductor?  R is the application.  You can
install R without being root, obviously you can't install it as a RPM
without being root.  Bioconductor is just a set of packages for R.  We
happen to provide a script which is a wrapper around one of those packages
(to provide bootstrapping), aka reposTools, which manages downloads and
installations.

Here's a hint:  You can use a Root-installed R and still install these
packages to any directory that you have permission to.  The method of how
to do this has been discussed on this list and the R-help list many
times.  Look at the .libPaths() function.

> RPM good.
> installation scripts bad.
> Get the picture.

We're an open development project.  If you would like to provide and
maintain an RPM of R with all of the Bioconductor packages built into it,
and then keep it up to date - we'd welcome the contribution.  Otherwise,
there is absolutely *no* need to have R installed on your own just to
install packages for R, Bioconductor or otherwise.

-J