[Rd] [R] Forking and adapting an R package

[Duncan Murdoch]

On 12/07/2016 7:28 AM, timo at timogrossenbacher.ch wrote:
> Hello.
>
> I'm trying to adapt the package “hexbin” to suit my needs. This is the first
> time I do this. I've read a bit through Hadley's “R packages”, but now I'm
> pretty lost (from a workflow point of view). I am using RStudio and Hadley's
> devtools.
>
> So I forked the repo I want to adapt: https://github.com/grssnbchr/hexbin  and
> cloned it using RStudio (I created a new project). What I basically want to do
> is adapt the package slightly and use the adapted source on my use case (an Rmd
> file in another location) - ideally, I would call the respective function
> (hexbin::grid.hexagons) in the Rmd and the source code of “hexbin” would be
> called and debugged (just for understanding what the package “hexbin” actually
> does in that case, I do not have to build it yet, or even publish it). What is
> the workflow for this?

This is more of an R-devel question, so I've posted my followup there 
(as well as a private copy to you).

The fact that you've forked the package shouldn't matter.  You are 
working in RStudio, so the way to work with a package is:

1.  Open the project consisting of your local package.
2.  In the Build pane, click on "Build and Reload".

What "Build and reload" does is to install the package from the source 
in the project, then restart R and load the installed package.

Test your code in this new R session.  If you're working on a vignette, 
you can open the vignette, and execute the code chunks one by one.

If they all succeed in that context, they still might not when you run 
checks:  it *won't* have your package loaded when it compiles a 
vignette.  You need to put an explicit

library(hexbin)

in one of the code chunks.

Duncan Murdoch

>
> Also, I tried running devtools::check() and it already fails there:
> R version 3.2.5 (2016-04-14) -- "Very, Very Secure Dishes"
>
> Platform: x86_64-pc-linux-gnu (64-bit)
>
>> devtools::check()
> Updating hexbin documentation
> Loading hexbin
> Creating a generic function for ‘plot’ from package ‘graphics’ in package
> ‘hexbin’
> Creating a generic function for ‘summary’ from package ‘base’ in package
> ‘hexbin’
> Setting env vars
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> CFLAGS : -Wall -pedantic
> CXXFLAGS: -Wall -pedantic
> Building hexbin
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> '/usr/lib/R/bin/R' --no-site-file --no-environ --no-save --no-restore --quiet
> CMD build '/home/tgrossen/R/hexbin' --no-resave-data --no-manual
>
> * checking for file ‘/home/tgrossen/R/hexbin/DESCRIPTION’ ... OK
> * preparing ‘hexbin’:
> * checking DESCRIPTION meta-information ... OK
> * cleaning src
> * installing the package to build vignettes
> * creating vignettes ... ERROR
>
> Error: processing vignette 'hexagon_binning.Rnw' failed with diagnostics:
>  chunk 1 (label = comphexsq)
> Error in eval(expr, envir, enclos) : could not find function “hexbin”
> Execution halted
> Error: Command failed (1)
>
> As you can see, I am very much lost. I googled for "adapt R package and debug"
> and so forth but couldn't find any tutorial or anything.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Timo
>
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