On Mon, 28 May 2007, Martin Maechler wrote: >>>>>> "Duncan" == Duncan Murdoch <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >>>>>> on Fri, 25 May 2007 15:38:54 -0400 writes: > > Duncan> On 5/25/2007 1:09 PM, Prof Brian Ripley wrote: > >> On Fri, 25 May 2007, Martin Maechler wrote: > >> > >>> > >>>> path.expand("~") > >>> [1] "/home/maechler" > >> Yes, but beware that may not do what you want on Windows > >> in R <= 2.5.0, since someone changed the definition of > >> 'home' but not path.expand. > > Duncan> A more basic problem is that the definition of "~" > Duncan> in Windows is very ambiguous. Is it my Cygwin home > Duncan> directory, where "cd ~" would take me while in > Duncan> Cygwin? > > most probably not (see below). The normal R Windows users > needn't know about Cygwin.
And a Unix-alike should have HOME set, and that overrides everything else on R for Windows, so probably yes if running from a Unix-alike shell. > Duncan> Is it my Windows CSIDL_PERSONAL folder, > Duncan> usually %HOMEDRIVE%/%HOMEPATH%/My Documents? Is it > Duncan> the parent of that folder, %HOMEDRIVE%/%HOMEPATH%? > > Duncan> "~" is a shell concept that makes sense in Unix-like > Duncan> shells, but not in Windows. > > Hmm.. > Let's just say "~" is a short cut for > "The user's home directory". > And yes, that's been a Unix concept for ages, but I think > Windows had adopted that concept, probably with the above > %HOMEDRIVE%/%HOMEPATH% We do explain in the rw-FAQ what R thinks the 'home directory' is on Windows. My comment was that had been altered, and path.expand was not altered to follow. Duncan M suggests that was uninportant, but I thought it worth fixing. > The fact that some of windows software may not "work with" > the user's home directory (but rather a subdirectory of that), > may be a separate issue, but then, "I'm the windows-non-expert" > > Martin Maechler > -- Brian D. Ripley, [EMAIL PROTECTED] 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 ______________________________________________ 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 and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.