Interesting discussion, even if it is technically off-topic (i.e. is about a Macports issue rather than an R issue).
For myself, I have found instances where I needed to install R through non-standard channels (my choice lately has been homebrew). This was largely related to having the required system tools necessary for a package development environment that permits the compilation of C/fortran code and some system libraries (gdal, etc). As Don and others pointed out many such dependencies should be available through the OSX R develop page (forget the address right now ...), I have some older machines for which those precompiled binaries do not install, including a 9 year old Macbook which will run OSX up to ElCapitan but is not compatible with the newer binaries. In that case, in order to have an R and gfortran that played together I had to use homebrew as I could not find a binary gfortran that would work for my architecture. I love working on OSX, though I have often lamented the difficulties in getting a suitable package development environment configured -- at least compared to Windows (just install Rtools.exe) and Linux (everything required is easily installed from the distro package manager). Clark > Message: 2 > Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2017 18:02:33 +0000 > From: "MacQueen, Don" <macque...@llnl.gov> > To: David Winsemius <dwinsem...@comcast.net>, Rainer Krug > <rainer_k...@icloud.com> > Cc: John <miao...@gmail.com>, "r-sig-mac@r-project.org" > <r-sig-mac@r-project.org> > Subject: Re: [R-SIG-Mac] Macports installation problem > Message-ID: <303cd3a3-230a-4d18-a190-e6c2d1160...@llnl.gov> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" > > The OP's question has inspired an interestingly large number of responses. > > One thing I'm curious about, and I don't think I've seen in the > discussion, is why the OP needed to install Cairo graphics with respect to > R (otherwise the question was indeed off-topic for R-sig-Mac). > > In summary (and I think this is reasonably consistent with other > responses; discussion to support my summary follows): > > 1) Use CRAN R, install dependencies needed for extended R capability on > the OS as needed, from whatever source you prefer, or whichever is easiest > for R to use > 2) If one chooses to install R using MacPorts or homebrew, be prepared to > exercise a greater depth of computer science smarts > 3) Feel free to install other useful stuff using MacPorts or homebrew, > whichever one prefers; there is unlikely to be any conflict with R > > > In close to 20 years of using R on Mac, I have always been able to use > whatever capabilities R offers that I wanted to use, using the R provided > on CRAN. Nothing has ever motivated me to install R using MacPorts or > homebrew in order to obtain some capability that I couldn't have using > CRAN's binary download for Mac. This includes things like access to remote > Oracle databases, using various spatial packages built around sp and rgdal, > reading and writing MS Office files (both Word and Excel), building simple > tcl/tk interfaces, writing my own packages that link to Fortran, and > probably more that I don't remember. I see no necessity to install R from > MacPorts or homebrew. Of course, if one wishes to for whatever reason, > great! And I'm glad that people have wanted to make R available from those > package managers. > > I do use MacPorts, however, to get useful software such as an X Windows > aware version of emacs, ghostscript, and ImageMagick. Indeed, I even have > cairo installed using MacPorts, albeit on a 10.11.6 system, not a 10.12.x > system like the OP. (It's probably there as a dependency for some other > MacPorts package.) From that point of view, the OP's command to install it > using MacPorts was correct. I'd need more information to make a guess at > why it didn't succeed. > > Some R packages do, of course, depend on external libraries not provided > with R. One has to install these from somewhere. For example, the spatial > packages need GDAL. In this case, I use the KyngChaos frameworks, but I'm > aware that they're also available from MacPorts (and probably homebrew as > well). Could I use them instead? Probably; R is pretty good about letting > the user specify where dependencies are found. > > I do not know what R extended capability depends on installing Cairo > graphics on the OS. The X11() graphics device, as provided (I believe), has > a version that uses cairo. There is the Cairo R package, but it has a > binary version, at least for R on 10.11.x, so there's no need to install > Cairo graphics to install the Cairo package. > > -Don > > -- > Don MacQueen > Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory > 7000 East Ave., L-627 > Livermore, CA 94550 > 925-423-1062 > Lab cell 925-724-7509 > > > [[alternative HTML version deleted]] _______________________________________________ R-SIG-Mac mailing list R-SIG-Mac@r-project.org https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-sig-mac