[R] warnings and errors with R CMD INSTALL

[Prof Brian Ripley]

On Wed, 5 Jan 2005, thomas wrote:

[...]

> Finally, it seems to me that the install.package should help to stay
> tuned with regards to required dependencies.
> Just found out, that some dependency descriptions of packages are
> somewhat missing some necessities,

I don't believe you have read the actual file:

Package: RODBC
Version: 1.1-2
...
SystemRequirements: An ODBC driver manager and drivers. See README.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

> i.e. RODBC package descriptions mentions:
> (..)
> R (>= 1.9.0)
> (..)
>
> When trying to install RODBC I had to learn that on my system there is:
>
> configure: error: "no ODBC driver manager found"
> ERROR: configuration failed for package 'RODBC'
>
> So, R CMD INSTALL seemingly doesn't take care of missing dependencies
> except given an error message.

It's a _system_ requirement, and R does not know how to install systems on 
your unstated system (and probably does not have permission too, either).

> Since I am relatively new to R I am kind of lost to figure out these
> dependencies on my own (think its getting better gradually).

You are not asked to, but you are asked to read the README.

-- 
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