R devel - Sep 2005 - Error report upon using the help.search( ) command (PR#8144)

Full_Name: P?l Trosvik
Version: 2.0.1
OS: Windows XP
Submission from: (NULL) (129.240.91.220)


Hi

Upon entering the command: help.search("linear") .I get the following
error
report:
Error in rbind(...) : number of columns of matrices must match (see arg 8)

I get the same error message whichever search term I enter between the quotation
marks. This function was working fine just a few weeks ago, and in the mean time
I haven't done anything unusual. All I have done is download a few packages
from
CRAN, namely 'pls' and 'splines', as well as
'gplots','gtools' and 'gdata'. I
have no idea what is causing this problem, but I guess it might be a bug. 

I shold perhaps mention that I saw an almost identical bug report entered in the
'not-repoducible' directory of previous bug reports by one Sabyasaschi
Ray on
020805.

His problem remains unsolved.

Best regards

P?l Trosvik
Ph.D. student
University of Oslo - Department of Biology/Norwegian Food Research Institute

>>>>> "paltr" == paltr  <paltr at bio.uio.no>
>>>>>     on Tue, 20 Sep 2005 11:24:18 +0200 (CEST) writes:
    paltr> Full_Name: P?l Trosvik Version: 2.0.1 
    paltr> OS: Windows XP Submission from: (NULL) (129.240.91.220)


    paltr> Upon entering the command: help.search("linear") 
    paltr> I get the following error report: Error in rbind(...) :
    paltr> number of columns of matrices must match (see arg 8)

    paltr> I get the same error message whichever search term I
    paltr> enter between the quotation marks. This function was
    paltr> working fine just a few weeks ago, and in the mean
    paltr> time I haven't done anything unusual. All I have done
    paltr> is download a few packages from CRAN, namely 'pls'
    paltr> and 'splines', as well as
'gplots','gtools' and
    paltr> 'gdata'. I have no idea what is causing this problem,
    paltr> but I guess it might be a bug.

it's a broken package in your library; i.e., one of the packages
you have added to your library is not properly installed.
Something which should not have happened if you installed
packages via the GUI or  install.packages() -- unless you have
interrupted the installation.
It also can happen very well if you use manual unzipping and
other non-supported ways of "putting packages in your library".

If you upgrade your version of R, the problem also goes away:
help.search() will produce warnings and continue searching
instead of producing an error when encountering incorrectly
installed packages.  So, please do upgrade.


    paltr> I shold perhaps mention that I saw an almost
    paltr> identical bug report entered in the 'not-repoducible'
    paltr> directory of previous bug reports by one Sabyasaschi
    paltr> Ray on 020805.

    paltr> His problem remains unsolved.

Well, I think this is about 3rd or 4th time the topic has come up.

Note that you are *NOT* supposed to send bug reports to R-bugs
when you use outdated versions of R.
It's fine to ask about it on R-help or R-devel if appropriate,
but sending a bug report for an outdated version is "no no!"

Regards,
Martin Maechler, ETH Zurich

    paltr> Best regards

    paltr> P?l Trosvik Ph.D. student University of Oslo -
    paltr> Department of Biology/Norwegian Food Research
    paltr> Institute

Please do not send a bug report on an obselete version of R.  2.1.1 is 
current and 2.2.0 is in alpha-testing.  (This is covered in the posting 
guide and the FAQ.)

It has been the case that a broken package DESCRIPTION could cause this, 
but as the comment on PR#8144 says, that has already been fixed.

If you use R's debugging tools you can find out which package is causing 
the problem and remove it.


On Tue, 20 Sep 2005 paltr at bio.uio.no wrote:
> Full_Name: P?l Trosvik
> Version: 2.0.1
> OS: Windows XP
> Submission from: (NULL) (129.240.91.220)
>
>
> Hi
>
> Upon entering the command: help.search("linear") .I get the
following error
> report:
> Error in rbind(...) : number of columns of matrices must match (see arg 8)
>
> I get the same error message whichever search term I enter between the
quotation
> marks. This function was working fine just a few weeks ago, and in the mean
time
> I haven't done anything unusual. All I have done is download a few
packages from
> CRAN, namely 'pls' and 'splines', as well as
'gplots','gtools' and 'gdata'. I
> have no idea what is causing this problem, but I guess it might be a bug.
>
> I shold perhaps mention that I saw an almost identical bug report entered
in the
> 'not-repoducible' directory of previous bug reports by one
Sabyasaschi Ray on
> 020805.
2002-08-05 or 2005-08-05 or what?
> His problem remains unsolved.
I don't think so. If this is PR#8044, please do read the comment:

   No R version given, not reproducible.
   This is probably due to a broken package, and if so already fixed.
                                                 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

-- 
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