[R] bagged importance estimates in earth problem

[Max Kuhn]

> If you read my message closely,  you'll see I'm indicating that the check
> error "may" explain why  carat 4.15 _is not available in CRAN binaries_.
> Because of this (not having the latest version) I suspect varImp is
> returning the error I detailed.

Ok, but your diagnosis of the issue may have been careless.

> Can you provide information as to why 4.15 is not available? That would be
> useful.

It is available here:

   http://cran.r-project.org/src/contrib/Archive/caret

Do you mean a binary for OS X? If so, you can look more closely at the
"caret Results" link:

   http://www.r-project.org/nosvn/R.check/r-release-macosx-ix86/caret-00check.html

you'll see it doesn't build because one of the dependencies (proxy)
isn't installed on the test machine. The package homepage listed in
the DESCRIPTION file shows the package building on OS X without any
errors. There is a OS X binary for the latest version there.

I suggest using the OS X disk (or the apple website) to install Xcode
and build packages from source. You're almost always better off
installing packages in that way.

> Also, as far a reproducible example is concerned, I noted that the example
> in bagEarth produces the same error as my original problem (i.e. I can
> reproduce the error on my machine with that code/data which is also
> available to others). Again, a more careful read of my original email would
> have made that clear.

It is not reproducible if it works for me and others.

Sorry for the frustration, but in your original email you didn't
follow the posting guide: email the package author first, provide
information about your system or an example that I can try.

If you dig around a little, I think the issues would be more clear,
especially why there is no OS X binary.

Max