R devel - May 2020 - Tcl.Tk Tktable package missing from R 4.0.0 on Windows

Dear R-devel list members,

The Tktable package for Tcl/Tk is apparently missing from the Windows
distribution of R 4.0.0. I (actually a user of the Rcmdr package) discovered
this when trying to use the new-data-set dialog in the Rcmdr package, producing
the error, "Tcl package 'Tktable' must be installed first."

I believe the Tktable has been part of the R distribution for Windows since R
version 2.9.0, and is still present in the macOS distribution of R 4.0.0.

I apologize for not discovering this problem prior to the release of R 4.0.0. I
did test the Rcmdr package under R 4.0.0 on both Windows and macOS, but not
every menu item and dialog on each platform.

Does anyone have more information about this problem? 

Thank you,
 John

  -----------------------------
  John Fox, Professor Emeritus
  McMaster University
  Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
  Web: http::/socserv.mcmaster.ca/jfox

On Sun, May 3, 2020 at 6:15 PM Fox, John <jfox at mcmaster.ca>
wrote:
>
> Dear R-devel list members,
>
> The Tktable package for Tcl/Tk is apparently missing from the Windows
distribution of R 4.0.0. I (actually a user of the Rcmdr package) discovered
this when trying to use the new-data-set dialog in the Rcmdr package, producing
the error, "Tcl package 'Tktable' must be installed first."
>
> I believe the Tktable has been part of the R distribution for Windows since
R version 2.9.0, and is still present in the macOS distribution of R 4.0.0.
>
> I apologize for not discovering this problem prior to the release of R
4.0.0. I did test the Rcmdr package under R 4.0.0 on both Windows and macOS, but
not every menu item and dialog on each platform.
>
> Does anyone have more information about this problem?
Sorry this was my mistake. I somehow missed tktable when updating the
tcltk bundle for rtools40. This didn't show up in any package check
either.

I've added it back now, it should work again in today's builds r-devel
and r-patched. Thanks for catching this.

Jeroen

Dear Jeroen,

Thank you very much for doing this.

I understand from other (off-list) correspondence that there is an intention to
remove Tktable from the macOS distribution of R when Tcl/Tk is updated there,
and so a more permanent solution is probably to provide Tktable via an R
package. I plan to pursue that possibility.

Best,
 John
> On May 4, 2020, at 3:01 AM, Jeroen Ooms <jeroenooms at gmail.com>
wrote:
> 
> On Sun, May 3, 2020 at 6:15 PM Fox, John <jfox at mcmaster.ca> wrote:
>> 
>> Dear R-devel list members,
>> 
>> The Tktable package for Tcl/Tk is apparently missing from the Windows
distribution of R 4.0.0. I (actually a user of the Rcmdr package) discovered
this when trying to use the new-data-set dialog in the Rcmdr package, producing
the error, "Tcl package 'Tktable' must be installed first."
>> 
>> I believe the Tktable has been part of the R distribution for Windows
since R version 2.9.0, and is still present in the macOS distribution of R
4.0.0.
>> 
>> I apologize for not discovering this problem prior to the release of R
4.0.0. I did test the Rcmdr package under R 4.0.0 on both Windows and macOS, but
not every menu item and dialog on each platform.
>> 
>> Does anyone have more information about this problem?
> 
> Sorry this was my mistake. I somehow missed tktable when updating the
> tcltk bundle for rtools40. This didn't show up in any package check
> either.
> 
> I've added it back now, it should work again in today's builds
r-devel
> and r-patched. Thanks for catching this.
> 
> Jeroen