Building a windows binary of a package on Linux - R-devel

Wed, Nov 30, 2005 6:33 AM #

Dear List,

Can I build a binary package (.zip) for Windows on my Linux machine from
my package sources? There is no C, C++, Fortran code involved, just
plain ol' R. I read through the article by Jun and Rossini, but (on
first reading) this seems more targeted at building a Windows version of
R and Windows package binaries that contain C, C++, Fortran code that
needs to be compiled.

Thanks,

Gav

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Gavin Simpson                     [T] +44 (0)20 7679 5522
ENSIS Research Fellow             [F] +44 (0)20 7679 7565
ENSIS Ltd. & ECRC                 [E] gavin.simpsonATNOSPAMucl.ac.uk
UCL Department of Geography       [W] http://www.ucl.ac.uk/~ucfagls/cv/
26 Bedford Way                    [W] http://www.ucl.ac.uk/~ucfagls/
London.  WC1H 0AP.
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Duncan Murdoch

Wed, Nov 30, 2005 7:46 AM #

On 11/30/2005 9:33 AM, Gavin Simpson wrote:

You should be able to.  Instructions are in the README.packages file in 
R_HOME/src/gnuwin32.  I don't know if you've got that file if you 
installed a pre-built R, but it's in the source tarball (and in 
https://svn.r-project.org/R.  Choose a tag subdirectory for a release 
version, or the trunk for the latest and greatest.  You'll probably get 
the same instructions on all recent ones, they don't change much.

Duncan Murdoch

Gavin Simpson

Wed, Nov 30, 2005 8:02 AM #

On Wed, 2005-11-30 at 10:46 -0500, Duncan Murdoch wrote:

My reading of README.packages would indicate that I need to download the
cross-compile tools as outlined in that README and in the Jun and
Rossini article in R News. I was wondering if it could be done without
all this extra stuff - but it appears not.

Thanks, Duncan for the prompt reply, I'll set aside some time to set
this up as described in the docs.

All the best,

Gav

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Gavin Simpson                     [T] +44 (0)20 7679 5522
ENSIS Research Fellow             [F] +44 (0)20 7679 7565
ENSIS Ltd. & ECRC                 [E] gavin.simpsonATNOSPAMucl.ac.uk
UCL Department of Geography       [W] http://www.ucl.ac.uk/~ucfagls/cv/
26 Bedford Way                    [W] http://www.ucl.ac.uk/~ucfagls/
London.  WC1H 0AP.
%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%

Duncan Murdoch

Wed, Nov 30, 2005 8:08 AM #

On 11/30/2005 11:02 AM, Gavin Simpson wrote:

Why not just try it?  If you don't compile anything, you shouldn't need 
the compilers set up, for example.  You'll definitely need GNU Make and 
zip/unzip and Perl, but you probably already have those.

Duncan Murdoch

Brian Ripley

Wed, Nov 30, 2005 8:09 AM #

On Wed, 30 Nov 2005, Gavin Simpson wrote:

A high proportion of the time you can just zip up the installed package on 
Linux.  We don't understand why some people have reported failures, but as 
this is not supported (and so is not tested regularly) we removed it from 
the documentation a while back.  But both Marc Schwartz and I succeeded 
a month or two ago.

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

Marc Schwartz (via MN)

Wed, Nov 30, 2005 8:10 AM #

On Wed, 2005-11-30 at 14:33 +0000, Gavin Simpson wrote:

Gavin,

If you have the source tarball, there is a file called README.packages
in .../src/gnuwin32 which describes the process. The details begin on
line 124 in that file. That too covers more than just R code based
packages.

If you just have R code only, you could use the following:

  cd R_HOME/library 
  zip -r9X mypkg mypkg

where 'mypkg' is the folder name of the _installed_ Linux version of the
package.

This creates 'mypkg.zip', which can then be installed on the Windows
side.

HTH,

Marc Schwartz

Gavin Simpson

Wed, Nov 30, 2005 8:32 AM #

On Wed, 2005-11-30 at 11:08 -0500, Duncan Murdoch wrote:

Ah, looks like I spoke too soon, as replies from Prof. Ripley and Marc
Schwartz indicate that I can just zip up the installed version of my
package on Linux if I just have R code. The specific reference to
zipping the installed package is the key. I was originally thinking
whether R CMD build etc. on my Linux system could be used to create a
windows binary. Zipping the installed package up is easy and will
suffice until I get time to set-up the other tools.

Thank you Duncan, Prof. Ripley and Marc for your ideas and suggestions.

All the best,

G

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Gavin Simpson                     [T] +44 (0)20 7679 5522
ENSIS Research Fellow             [F] +44 (0)20 7679 7565
ENSIS Ltd. & ECRC                 [E] gavin.simpsonATNOSPAMucl.ac.uk
UCL Department of Geography       [W] http://www.ucl.ac.uk/~ucfagls/cv/
26 Bedford Way                    [W] http://www.ucl.ac.uk/~ucfagls/
London.  WC1H 0AP.
%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%~%