[Rd] Building R package: “Found 'rand', possibly from 'rand' (C)” NOTE when checking package

[Berend Hasselman]

On 02-11-2014, at 12:20, January Weiner <january.weiner at gmail.com> wrote:

> I am building a package that makes a simple visualization. A part of
> the code is in C++, and utilizes the functions srand() and rand() for
> purposes not related to statistics (introducing random noise in the
> visualization). The package compiles without problems on my
> workstation(s), but when I submitted it to the winbuilder service, I
> got the following weird message:
> 
> * checking compiled code ... NOTE
> File 'tagcloud/libs/i386/tagcloud.dll':
>  Found 'rand', possibly from 'rand' (C)
>    Object: 'overlap.o'
>  Found 'srand', possibly from 'srand' (C)
>    Object: 'overlap.o'
> File 'tagcloud/libs/x64/tagcloud.dll':
>  Found 'rand', possibly from 'rand' (C)
>    Object: 'overlap.o'
>  Found 'srand', possibly from 'srand' (C)
>    Object: 'overlap.o'
> 
> Compiled code should not call entry points which might terminate R nor
> write to stdout/stderr instead of to the console, nor the C RNG.
> 
> To the best of my knowledge, I don't see where in the code I "call
> entry points which might terminate R" or "write to stdout/stderr", but
> then, if I remove the calls to rand/srand, this message disappears.
> 

Which version of R on your workstation?
Your code should also not call the C RNG (rand and srand) as the message clearly states.

Berend

> You can review the package her:e
> http://win-builder.r-project.org/toy6frr57aCU/
> 
> Kind regards,
> 
> January
> 
> -- 
> -------- January Weiner --------------------------------------
> 
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