configure can't find readline -- but it's there!

Am trying to install 2.14.0 on a CentOS system.  The configure script
apparently can't find something to do with the readline library:

Configure: error: --with-readline=yes (default) and headers/libs are not
available

Yes, I know I need readline 4.2 or later.  "yum" assures me that rev 5.1
is already installed.

And I know I need to provide configuration flags if it is in a
non-system directory, but such is not the case.  readline was put in
with a standard OS installation.

And I know that I need the full developer package, as opposed to the
user only versions, but the heck if I can find any such separate
package.  "yum" doesn't know anything about it.

So, in short, I have a completely standard install of readline, as far
as I can tell, but the configure script can't find it.

Anyone have any ideas?

Thanks.

Hi,

The typical solution would be to install the readline-devel RPM, which is where the header files, etc. would be available. 

So as root:

  yum install readline-devel

or if you have sudo enabled:

  sudo yum install readline-devel

HTH,

Marc Schwartz

Thanks, Marc.  That did it.  I thought "yum provides" would have been
smart enough to tell me about any "devel" package, but I guess I have
something left to learn there.  Thanks.

--Sam


-----Original Message-----
From: Marc Schwartz [mailto:marc_schwartz at me.com] 
Sent: Thursday, December 29, 2011 9:28 PM
To: Cable, Sam B Civ USAF AFMC AFRL/RVBXI
Cc: r-help at r-project.org
Subject: Re: [R] configure can't find readline -- but it's there!


Hi,

The typical solution would be to install the readline-devel RPM, which
is where the header files, etc. would be available. 

So as root:

  yum install readline-devel

or if you have sudo enabled:

  sudo yum install readline-devel

HTH,

Marc Schwartz

Hi Sam,

It has been almost 3 years since I last used Linux (Fedora), but if memory serves using, as root, either:

 yum provides readline.h

or perhaps

 yum search readline

might be possible ways of getting the names of the relevant RPMs in the repos. You might have to tweak the 'readline' argument to get it to work (eg. readline* or something similar).

The need for the *-devel RPMs is referenced in the R Installation and Administration manual (Appendix A) and is a FAQ over the years here.

One other comment, which you may not be aware of. Pre-built R binaries are available for RHEL and CentOS via the EPEL:

  http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/EPEL

Adding the EPEL repos to your system would then allow you to install R using yum as root:

  yum install R

rather than building from source. R 2.14.0 is there now, however, R 2.14.1 is not yet present. I would guess that Tom Callaway et al would be working on that RSN.
  
Regards,

Marc

Thanks, Marc.  That did it.  I thought "yum provides" would have been
smart enough to tell me about any "devel" package, but I guess I have
something left to learn there.  Thanks.

--Sam


-----Original Message-----
From: Marc Schwartz [mailto:marc_schwartz at me.com] 
Sent: Thursday, December 29, 2011 9:28 PM
To: Cable, Sam B Civ USAF AFMC AFRL/RVBXI
Cc: r-help at r-project.org
Subject: Re: [R] configure can't find readline -- but it's there!


Hi,

The typical solution would be to install the readline-devel RPM, which
is where the header files, etc. would be available. 

So as root:

 yum install readline-devel

or if you have sudo enabled:

 sudo yum install readline-devel

HTH,

Marc Schwartz