[R] Building an R package under Windows NT

[Benjamin.STABLER@odot.state.or.us]

The version of Perl I have is:

  This is perl, version 5.005_02 built for MSWin32-x86-object

  Copyright 1987-1998, Larry Wall

  Binary build 506 provided by ActiveState Tool Corp.
http://www.ActiveState.com
  Built 15:40:37 Oct 27 1998

It was installed by my IS department some time ago.  I will try installing
Perl 5.8 and see if that works.

Since "Rcmd build -h" does not print a description of the acceptable values
for "--docs=", I thought I would look for something similar.  The
"--docs=TYPE" option for build and the "--type=TYPE" for Rdconv looked
related so I thought I would give it a try.  Without knowing what the
correct values for "--docs=TYPE" are, how am I suppose to know that
"--docs=TYPE" is not the same as "--type=TYPE" for specifing what types of
help documents to create?  I don't think it is a stretch to see how these
two could be confused.


>-----Original Message-----
>From: Prof Brian Ripley [mailto:ripley at stats.ox.ac.uk]
>Sent: Tuesday, June 03, 2003 12:48 AM
>To: STABLER Benjamin
>Subject: RE: [R] Building an R package under Windows NT
>
>
>On Mon, 2 Jun 2003 Benjamin.STABLER at odot.state.or.us wrote:
>
>> Professor Ripley,
>> 
>> I just downloaded and installed the most current tools from your site
>> (http://www.stats.ox.ac.uk/pub/Rtools/), I have version 
>5.005_02 of Perl,
>> and I still get the same error.  Do you think Perl 5.8 would 
>*fix* this
>> problem?
>
>I have no idea, but I do know that correcting all of *your* 
>errors would 
>solve the problem.  As that version of Perl was AFAIK never 
>released for 
>Windows (and has not been available for several years if it 
>was), I think 
>you need to try to follow the instructions *exactly* (which 
>you have not 
>done re Perl, which says
>
>  The Windows port of perl5, available via
>  http://www.activestate.com/Products/ActivePerl/.
>  BEWARE: you do need the *Windows* port and not the Cygwin one.
>
>).
> 
>> I didn't think the docs=html option would work as I got the 
>html option from
>> the Rdconv type=TYPE help since the build help does not list 
>the options.  I
>> didn't think to look at the install help.
>
>Why do you think --type (sic) takes the same values as --docs ?
>
>
>-- 
>Brian D. Ripley,                  ripley at stats.ox.ac.uk
>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
>