Error updating packages

Thank you for the quick response Simon. Unfortunately I'm still having  
problems. When I try to run update using the GUI (after clicking on  
the lock in the GUI and authenticating) I get a message saying that it  
is "not possible to install binary packages from a remote repository  
as root."

I've tried starting R from the terminal as root (sudo R) and issuing  
the update.packages() command, but I still get the "cannot remove  
prior installation" error.

I've even tried modifying the permissions on /Library/Frameworks/ 
R.framework/Versions/2.6/Resources/library, without effect.

This is actually even more worrisome than I first thought, because  
after the installation fails I find that the package that cannot be  
removed is no longer installed! For example, after the first error the  
boot package was no longer installed. When I reissued the  
update.packages command again the error message skipped to the next  
package in the list (i.e., "Error: cannot remove prior installation of  
package ?lattice?").

I was able to reinstall boot and lattice without incident, but I'm  
finding the whole business  very strange.

Thanks again for the quick response, and for any additional help you  
might be able to offer.
-Ista

On Feb 29, 2008, at 9:43 AM, Ista Zahn wrote:

Hi,
When I try to update packages I get an error saying

Error: cannot remove prior installation of package ?boot?

This happens both when I use the GUI and when I issue
update.packages() from the command prompt. Does anyone know what the
problem might be? I'm running R 2.6.2 on OS X 10.5.2.

It is highly likely that you don't have enough permissions to delete  
the "boot" package. Login as admin and/or root and remove the  
package. Alternatively, if you are admin, you can authorize as root  
(by clicking on the lock in the R GUI toolbar) and perform the  
upgrade. Be sure to de-authorize after you're done (by clicking on  
the lock symbol again).

Cheers,
Simon