[R] Rtools and things dependent on it

Sat Feb 24 03:19:38 CET 2024

David,

I greatly appreciate the explanation you gave regarding R tools providing tools available in Linux distros, but not found in Windows. (I am using a windows system). Does this mean that Linux users don't need to use R tools when they want to compile R code?

Additionally, thank you for the information about what I should read. I will look at the material again, and hopefully things the material you suggest I read will be more understandable.

John

P.S. This email should be in txt format, not html. I sent if from my desktop windows machine which provides more options than does my iPhone.

John David Sorkin M.D., Ph.D.
Professor of Medicine, University of Maryland School of Medicine;
Associate Director for Biostatistics and Informatics, Baltimore VA Medical Center Geriatrics Research, Education, and Clinical Center;
PI Biostatistics and Informatics Core, University of Maryland School of Medicine Claude D. Pepper Older Americans Independence Center;
Senior Statistician University of Maryland Center for Vascular Research;

Division of Gerontology and Paliative Care,
10 North Greene Street
GRECC (BT/18/GR)
Baltimore, MD 21201-1524
Cell phone 443-418-5382

________________________________________
From: David Winsemius <dwinsemius using comcast.net>
Sent: Friday, February 23, 2024 8:14 PM
To: Sorkin, John
Cc: avi.e.gross using gmail.com; r-help using r-project.org
Subject: Re: [R] Rtools and things dependent on it

On 2/23/24 16:28, Sorkin, John wrote:
David,
My apologies regarding the format of my email. I am replying using my iPhone, and I can’t find a way to switch from what I suspect is html to txt format.
The link you sent told me that R tools allows compilation of code.

It's specifically designed to provide the code tools missing in Windows that would other wise have been provided by a typical Linux distro. More expansively, it allows compilation of code written in C and/or Fortran using the version that was used to build the matching R version and allows it to be called by the routines written in R that bind a package together.

This is good to know, but beyond this important fact, the rest of the material was close to unintelligible.

The phrase "the rest of the material" is not specific enough to offer more explanation. You should quote material that is beyond your understanding. You should only be reading the sections named: "Installing Rtools43" and "Building packages from source using Rtools43". I doubt that material further on would be relevant.

--

David

I doubt this is the fault of the author, it is probably because I lack some basic knowledge. Can you suggest some more basic material I can read. Please note. I am not computer naive, I am simply missing basic knowledge of the material discussed in the web page.
Thank you,
John
John David Sorkin M.D., Ph.D.
Professor of Medicine
Chief, Biostatistics and Informatics
University of Maryland School of Medicine Division of Gerontology and Geriatric Medicine
Baltimore VA Medical Center
10 North Greene Street<x-apple-data-detectors://12>
GRECC<x-apple-data-detectors://12> (BT/18/GR)
Baltimore, MD 21201-1524<x-apple-data-detectors://13/0>
(Phone) 410-605-711<tel:410-605-7119>9
(Fax) 410-605-7913<tel:410-605-7913> (Please call phone number above prior to faxing)

On Feb 23, 2024, at 7:01 PM, David Winsemius <dwinsemius using comcast.net><mailto:dwinsemius using comcast.net> wrote:

On 2/23/24 14:34, avi.e.gross using gmail.com<mailto:avi.e.gross using gmail.com> wrote:
This may be a dumb question and the answer may make me feel dumber.

I have had trouble for years with R packages wanting Rtools on my machine
and not being able to use it. Many packages are fine as binaries are
available. I have loaded Rtools and probably need to change my PATH or
something.

I suppose making sure that whatever directory holds your Rtools code is
on your path would be a good idea. I wondered if there's an environment
variable that could be set, but reading the page on using Rtools did not
mention one until I got down to the section on building R from source
which is surely NOT what you want to do.. You should read the
information on installation and building packages from source.
https://cran.r-project.org/bin/windows/base/howto-R-devel.html<https://cran.r-project.org/bin/windows/base/howto-R-devel.html> which
includes this sentence:

"It is recommended to use the defaults and install into|c:/rtools43|.
When done that way, Rtools43 may be used in the same R session which
installed it or which was started before Rtools43 was installed."

But I recently suggested to someone that they might want to use the tabyl()
function in the janitor package that I find helpful. I get a warning when I
install it about Rtools but it works fine. When they install it, it fails. I
assumed they would get it from CRAN the same way I did as we are both using
Windows and from within RSTUDIO.

In the past, I have run into other packages I could not use and just moved
on but it seems like time to see if this global problem has a work-around.

And, in particular, I have the latest versions of both R and RSTUDIO which
can be a problem when other things are not as up-to-date.

Or, maybe some people with R packages could be convinced to make binaries
available in the first place?

Binaries are automatically produced by CRAN but perhaps you are trying
to install from some other source? It would help if you could be
specific about several missing pieces of information: Operating system,
R version, Rtools version, current location of Rtools, names of packages
and where they were obtained.

Regards and good luck;

David (a.k.a IRTFM)

Avi

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