[Rd] error unserializing ascii format (v2 or v3)

[Tomas Kalibera]

Thanks, fixed in R-devel and R-patched.

The problem was only in unserializing of raw vectors serialized in 
ASCII, the format is not affected. Old serialized ASCII files created by 
R 3.5 or earlier can be read in R-patched and re-saved in binary format, 
which can in turn be read in R 3.5 and earlier. 
Serialization/unserialization in binary format is not affected by this 
problem.

Best
Tomas

On 11/8/18 11:41 AM, peter dalgaard wrote:
> I see this on MacOS as well, so likely not platform dependent.
>
> A little more diddling to try to narrow it down:
>
>> unserialize(serialize(as.raw(1), NULL, version=2, ascii=TRUE))
> [1] 30
>> unserialize(serialize(list(as.raw(1)), NULL, version=2, ascii=TRUE))
> [[1]]
> [1] 30
>
>> unserialize(serialize(list(raw=as.raw(1)), NULL, version=2, ascii=TRUE))
> Error in unserialize(serialize(list(raw = as.raw(1)), NULL, version = 2,  :
>    'installTrChar' must be called on a CHARSXP, but got 'pairlist'
>> unserialize(serialize(list(r=as.raw(1)), NULL, version=2, ascii=TRUE))
> Error in unserialize(serialize(list(r = as.raw(1)), NULL, version = 2,  :
>    'installTrChar' must be called on a CHARSXP, but got 'pairlist'
>> unserialize(serialize(list(r=1), NULL, version=2, ascii=TRUE))
> $r
> [1] 1
>
>> unserialize(serialize(list(as.raw(c(1,2))), NULL, version=2, ascii=TRUE))
> [[1]]
> [1] 30 31
>
>
> So it looks like there is an issue with reading a named list containing a raw vector. Unnamed lists work and so does non-raw vectors. The length of the vector doesn't seem to matter and neither does the actual name.
>
> You can vary the error message by varying the entries in the vector, but the gist of it is that something gets misinterpreted and the rest of the data stop making sense.
>
> I also tried going explicitly through a text connection, and that seems exactly equivalent.
>
> -pd
>
>> On 7 Nov 2018, at 23:35 , Michael Sannella via R-devel <r-devel using r-project.org> wrote:
>>
>> I ran into an interesting error unserializing a file created with
>> ascii=TRUE:
>>
>> R 3.5.1 (Windows or Linux):
>>> unserialize(serialize(list(raw=as.raw(c(39,41))), NULL, version=2,
>> ascii=TRUE))
>>     Error in unserialize(serialize(list(raw = as.raw(c(39, 41))), NULL,
>> version = 2,  :
>>       ReadItem: unknown type 29, perhaps written by later version of R
>>
>> The same error happens when the serialization is done with version=2
>> or version=3.  It does not happen if the serialization is done with
>> ascii=FALSE.
>>
>> Note that 0x29 == 41.  It looks like unserialize is reading the wrong
>> line.
>>
>> I tried this in earlier versions of R on Windows, and the same error
>> happens in every version from R-2.15.3 (the earliest I have) on up.
>>
>>   ~~ Michael Sannella
>>
>> 	[[alternative HTML version deleted]]
>>
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