[Rd] Re: [R] pl/R and MacOS X using R binary

[Prof Brian Ripley]

[Moved from R-help.]

On Tue, 19 Apr 2005, Sean Davis wrote:

> I'm sorry if this is too off-topic--feel free to ignore.  I am interested in 
> using pl/R, an amazing "plugin" for the postgresql database.  As is typical 
> of these types of applications, pl/R needs to link against a shared library. 
> However, it appears that the MacOS R binary does not build a static (.so) 
> shared library.

Excuse me, but a .so is a DSO, a Dynamic _Shared_ Object.  What does 
`static' have to do with this?  libR is a dynamic library, actually 
libR$(DYLIB_EXT) with values of .so. .sl and .dylib being known.

> Is there an accepted, general way (read, a way that works) 
> for linking against R (presumably the dylib) on the Mac?

Yes, since that is how the GUI on MacOS X works.

My guess is that you think that pl/R requires libR.so: if correct that is 
a false assumption made somewhere along the line, and the best thing to do 
is to consult the author.  In any case

http://www.joeconway.com/plr/doc/plr-install.html

just says

   Tip:  R headers are required. Download and install R prior to building
    PL/R. R must have been built with the --enable-R-shlib option when it
    was configured, in order for the libR shared object library to be available.


Please do consult the posting guide as to the right place.  (I've moved 
this to R-devel and included Joe Conway. Joe: perhaps you could make you 
email address more readily available in the PL/R pages.)

-- 
Brian D. Ripley,                  ripley at stats.ox.ac.uk
Professor of Applied Statistics,  http://www.stats.ox.ac.uk/~ripley/
University of Oxford,             Tel:  +44 1865 272861 (self)
1 South Parks Road,                     +44 1865 272866 (PA)
Oxford OX1 3TG, UK                Fax:  +44 1865 272595