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R 2.3 crashes when attempting package installation

3 messages · Matthew Cohen, Simon Urbanek, Rob Goedman

Matthew Cohen
# 
I am using the latest R (2.3) within Emacs/ESS on an iMac G5.

When I type "install.packages()" within R, the program crashes, generating the
following error:
--- Please select a CRAN mirror for use in this session ---

*** caught segfault ***
address 0x5f4d4550, cause 'memory not mapped'

Traceback:
1: download.file(url = paste(repos, "PACKAGES.gz", sep = "/"), destfile = tmpf, 
   method = method, cacheOK = FALSE, quiet = TRUE, mode = "wb")
2: try(download.file(url = paste(repos, "PACKAGES.gz", sep = "/"),     destfile
= tmpf, method = method, cacheOK = FALSE, quiet = TRUE,     mode = "wb"),
silent = TRUE)
3: available.packages(contriburl = contriburl, method = method)
4: install.packages()

What am I doing wrong?

Matt
Simon Urbanek
# 
Thanks, Matt.
On Apr 28, 2006, at 1:32 PM, mcohen at mail.la.utexas.edu wrote:

            

      
      
      
    

        
Problem #1 - the repository you try doesn't have the packages - try  
the main CRAN site first and then some other mirror near you.

            

      
      
      
    

        
Problem #2 - it shouldn't crash. Strangely enough this crash happens  
even with old builds of R as well. I have traced it down to  
localization of the HTTP code, but can't figure out why it should  
die. Minimal reproducible code is

download.file("http://www.google.com/foo","/tmp/foo")

(the site doesn't matter as long as it responds with 404). I'll see  
if I can come up with a fix (possibly over the weekend) ...

Cheers,
Simon