On Sat, 1 Jan 2005, Liaw, Andy wrote: > > From: Paul Roebuck > > > > > Please read ?install.packages. It's most definitely not a bug for a > > > function that works as documented. If you want, you might take the > > > source for install.packages and strip it down to do what you want, > > > say something called installLocalPackages. > > > > Well, I called myself having read it but it still wasn't obvious > > to me; hence I posted the question here. Exactly which part should > > I have read more carefully? I will grant that I left out one thing > > when I did my cut'n'paste but it doesn't change the result. > > My attempt to install my local package should have read: > > > > > install.packages("mypkg", > > contriburl = uri.pkg, > > lib = Sys.getenv("R_LIBS")) > > > > Looking at the source, 'tmpd' is only set if the protocol > > is not "file:". Since I use that protocol, it would seem > > to me that passing 'NULL' instead of 'tempfile("Rinstdir")' > > would constitute a bug. > > The version of ?install.packages (in R-2.0.1) I've read never said > it could install local source packages, so why would it be > considered a bug not being able to do something that is never > claimed? You seem to expect the function to do something that > it is never designed to do.
The name of the routine made the claim, not I. One could be forgiven for assuming it could since the 'contriburl' argument implies it could use a CD. I've used it in the past for local installs by simulating the CRAN directory structure and overriding the 'CRAN' argument but that's kind of a hassle for something quick. Perhaps it should be renamed 'install.packages.from.CRAN' since the current name implies something different to me. The programmer in me would still call the current situation a bug - the if statement around the 'localcran' variable is missing the else case to handle this scenario. Assuming so, I really don't see why this [w|c]ouldn't handle local source installs. And if it can't (and never could be made to do so), then the code should have a 'stop("local install unimplemented")' there so no one else ever has to ask again. ---------------------------------------------------------- SIGSIG -- signature too long (core dumped) ______________________________________________ R-help@stat.math.ethz.ch mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide! http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html