R devel - May 2017 - Somewhat obscure bug in R 3.4.0 building from source

Hi,

I uncovered a bug in installing R 3.4.0 from source in Linux, following the
standard procedure (configure; make; make install). Is this an appropriate
place to report this bug? If not, can you please direct me to the
appropriate place?

The error occurs only when I do "make clean" followed by
"make" again; make
works the first time.

The error is a failure to build NEWS.pdf:

Error in texi2dvi(file = file, pdf = TRUE, clean = clean, quiet = quiet,  :
  pdflatex is not available
Calls: <Anonymous> -> texi2pdf -> texi2dvi
Execution halted
make[1]: *** [NEWS.pdf] Error 1
make: [docs] Error 2 (ignored)

and can be reproduced wit the following sequence:

./configure
make
make clean
make

This suggests to me that perhaps "make clean" is not working.

I'm happy to provide more details so that you are able to reproduce the bug.

Thanks,

Peter Carbonetto, Ph.D.
Computational Staff Scientist, Statistics & Genetics
Research Computing Center
University of Chicago

	[[alternative HTML version deleted]]

On 21/05/2017 10:30 AM, Peter Carbonetto wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I uncovered a bug in installing R 3.4.0 from source in Linux, following the
> standard procedure (configure; make; make install). Is this an appropriate
> place to report this bug? If not, can you please direct me to the
> appropriate place?
Generally R-devel is better; I've responded there.
>
> The error occurs only when I do "make clean" followed by
"make" again; make
> works the first time.
>
> The error is a failure to build NEWS.pdf:
>
> Error in texi2dvi(file = file, pdf = TRUE, clean = clean, quiet = quiet,  :
>   pdflatex is not available
> Calls: <Anonymous> -> texi2pdf -> texi2dvi
> Execution halted
> make[1]: *** [NEWS.pdf] Error 1
> make: [docs] Error 2 (ignored)
>
> and can be reproduced wit the following sequence:
>
> ./configure
> make
> make clean
> make
We usually don't build in the source directory; see the second 
recommendation in the admin manual section 2.1.  So it's possible 
there's a bug triggered when you do that.  Can you try building in a 
separate directory?

Duncan Murdoch
>
> This suggests to me that perhaps "make clean" is not working.
>
> I'm happy to provide more details so that you are able to reproduce the
bug.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Peter Carbonetto, Ph.D.
> Computational Staff Scientist, Statistics & Genetics
> Research Computing Center
> University of Chicago
>
> 	[[alternative HTML version deleted]]
>
> ______________________________________________
> R-help at r-project.org mailing list -- To UNSUBSCRIBE and more, see
> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help
> PLEASE do read the posting guide
http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html
> and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
>

On Sun, 21 May 2017, Peter Carbonetto wrote:
> The error occurs only when I do "make clean" followed by
"make" again;
> make works the first time.
Peter,

   I suggest you use 'make distclean' rather than 'make clean.'
There are
subtle differences between the two, yet the former is more complete. This
might resolve your missing file issue during a second build.

Rich

... and whether or not Rich's suggestion resolves your difficulties,
please google such issues in future; e.g.

"report bugs R"

brought up all sorts of info on R bug reporting.

-- Bert


Bert Gunter

"The trouble with having an open mind is that people keep coming along
and sticking things into it."
-- Opus (aka Berkeley Breathed in his "Bloom County" comic strip )


On Sun, May 21, 2017 at 7:30 AM, Peter Carbonetto
<peter.carbonetto at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I uncovered a bug in installing R 3.4.0 from source in Linux, following the
> standard procedure (configure; make; make install). Is this an appropriate
> place to report this bug? If not, can you please direct me to the
> appropriate place?
>
> The error occurs only when I do "make clean" followed by
"make" again; make
> works the first time.
>
> The error is a failure to build NEWS.pdf:
>
> Error in texi2dvi(file = file, pdf = TRUE, clean = clean, quiet = quiet,  :
>   pdflatex is not available
> Calls: <Anonymous> -> texi2pdf -> texi2dvi
> Execution halted
> make[1]: *** [NEWS.pdf] Error 1
> make: [docs] Error 2 (ignored)
>
> and can be reproduced wit the following sequence:
>
> ./configure
> make
> make clean
> make
>
> This suggests to me that perhaps "make clean" is not working.
>
> I'm happy to provide more details so that you are able to reproduce the
bug.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Peter Carbonetto, Ph.D.
> Computational Staff Scientist, Statistics & Genetics
> Research Computing Center
> University of Chicago
>
>         [[alternative HTML version deleted]]
>
> ______________________________________________
> R-help at r-project.org mailing list -- To UNSUBSCRIBE and more, see
> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help
> PLEASE do read the posting guide
http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html
> and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.