[Rd] R-devel/R-patched crossed with Xterm/IDLE

[Jan de Leeuw]

Two versions of R
	1. R-patched (compiled with X11 support, and tcl/tk for X11)
	2. R-devel (compiled with native tcl/tk support, without-x)
	
UI's
	1. Terminal.app (or an Xterm) with an X server running.
	2. IDLE (i.e. native Python GUI with native tkinter) with Rpy loaded.  
No X server.
	
Packages with "problems"
	1. tcltk
	2. methods
	
The "normal" combination is to use Terminal.app with R-patched. This  
uses
X11.  All tcltk demos work. The methods package
works. We cannot use Terminal.app with the quartz device or with
native tcltk, because the windows do not accept events (cannot be
brought to the front). I know why this does not work (Terminal.app
is the frontmost application and it does not know anything about those
windows).

IDLE/Rpy with R-devel can do some of the tcltk demos (tkcanvas,  
tkdensity, tkfaq)
but not all (tkttest,tkfindfile). And, surprisingly enough, IDLE/Rpy  
with
R-patched can do the same demos (and fails on the same demos), although
its tcltk is compiled using fink's X11 based tk. No X server is running  
in these cases.
I have no idea why some demos work and others don't. It's interesting  
that
IDLE/Rpy uses the native AquaTk provided by tkinter, and does not ask  
for
X11. In IDLE/Rpy both the quartz device window and the tk windows  
respond to
mouse and keyboard events.

IDLE/Rpy with R-patched loads the method package, but IDLE/Rpy with  
R-devel
does not. It complains about missing symbols, notably ATTRIB, in  
methods.so,
which the executable (bundle_loader) also cannot find. In R-devel  
everything
is compiled with two-level namespaces, and only the methods package uses
R.bin as bundle_loader (otherwise it does not dump). In R-patched all  
bundles
use flat namespaces.

===
Jan de Leeuw; Professor and Chair, UCLA Department of Statistics;
Editor: Journal of Multivariate Analysis, Journal of Statistical  
Software
US mail: 9432 Boelter Hall, Box 951554, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1554
phone (310)-825-9550;  fax (310)-206-5658;  email: deleeuw@stat.ucla.edu
homepage: http://gifi.stat.ucla.edu
   
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