Common package installation problems

[hadley]

It would be useful to have a blog post that describes each of the following problems, how to detect, and how to fix:

• install.package() on windows when package has dll, and is currently loaded

• You install package that links to another package, but the ABI has changed so the code randomly crashes

• You install_github() a package that's loaded and when accessing the docs you get a the -3 decompress error

[jennybc]

This post would be natural to co-develop as we flesh out the Personal R Admin section of the What They Forgot materials.

cc @jimhester

[wch]

• On Windows, when there are long filenames, spaces, or non-ASCII characters in a path, and the filesystem is configured without short file names, installation can fail. http://r.789695.n4.nabble.com/Bug-Issues-on-Windows-with-SFN-disabled-td4745459.html There are a number of paths used in the installation process where this can show up.

  • If R is installed in "C:/Program Files/...", the error is something like this (C:\Program is not recognized as internal or external program r-lib/devtools#1514):

    'C:\Program' is not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program or batch file.
    Installation failed: Command failed (1)
    

  • If the destination library path has such a filename, the error is something like this (Install fails with non-ASCII characters in Windows user path (install_github) r-lib/remotes#114):

    Warning in file(file, if (append) "a" else "w") :
      cannot open file 'C:/Users/Johann Gr|ndl/Documents/R/win-library/3.4/httr/DESCRIPTION': Invalid argument
    Error in file(file, if (append) "a" else "w") : 
      cannot open the connection
    ERROR: installing package DESCRIPTION failed for package 'httr'
    

  • If the temp directory has such a filename and the package is being installed from source, the error is something like this (Trouble installing R6 r-lib/R6#182):

    * Error in .read_description(dfile) :
      file 'C:/Users/ÁëÝîáíäñïò/AppData/Local/Temp/Rtmpmse9yJ/R.INSTALL133033a5e41/R6/DESCRIPTION' does not exist
      ERROR: installing package DESCRIPTION failed for package 'R6'
    

• unzip doesn't work correctly. (Though maybe this is fixed?) install_github fails with unzip error r-lib/devtools#1464

• Configure scripts failing due to temp dir being mounted with noexec. httpuv install error on RHEL 7.5 rstudio/httpuv#159

• Outdated (binary) versions of package due to using an old version of R for which CRAN doesn't have updated binaries.

• Outdated versions of packages due to stale CRAN mirror.

[yutannihilation]

unzip doesn't work correctly. (Though maybe this is fixed?)

IIUC, it won't be fixed, but now correctly raises an error.

r-lib/remotes#84 (comment)

[yutannihilation]

install.package() on windows when package has dll, and is currently loaded

Just in case you don't notice, devtools::install_packages() cannot be used for the packages it imports (e.g. rlang, glue) even on a fresh session.

c.f. https://yutani.rbind.io/post/a-survival-guide-to-install-rlang-from-github-on-windows/