R devel - Oct 2021 - Environment setting _R_CHECK_DEPENDS_ONLY_='true'

(this should have been posted to R-package-devel, not R-devel)

Am 20.10.21 um 00:17 schrieb John Maindonald via
R-devel:
> Setting
> Sys,setenv('_R_CHECK_DEPENDS_ONLY_'=?true?)
> or Sys,setenv('_R_CHECK_DEPENDS_ONLY_?=TRUE)
> 
> (either appear to be acceptable) appears to have no effect when I do, e.g.
If you set the environment variable inside a running R process, it will 
only affect that process and child processes, but not an independent R 
process launched from a shell like you seem to be doing here:
> 
> $R CMD check qra_0.2.4.tar.gz
> * using log directory ?/Users/johnm1/pkgs/qra.Rcheck?
> * using R version 4.1.1 (2021-08-10)
> * using platform: x86_64-apple-darwin17.0 (64-bit)
> * using session charset: UTF-8
> . . .
> 
> (This should have failed.)
How to set environment variables is system-specific. On a Unix-like 
system, you could use the command

_R_CHECK_DEPENDS_ONLY_=true  R CMD check qra_0.2.4.tar.gz

to set the environment variable for this R process.
See, e.g., https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environment_variable.

Best regards,

	Sebastian Meyer

> 
> I?d have expected that the "On most systems . . .? mentioned in the
Writing R extensions
> manual (1.1.3.1 Suggested packages) would include my setup.
> 
> Any insight on what I am missing will be welcome.
> 
> John Maindonald             email: john.maindonald at anu.edu.au
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ______________________________________________
> R-devel at r-project.org mailing list
> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel
>

On 20 October 2021 at 09:31, Sebastian Meyer wrote:
| If you set the environment variable inside a running R process, it will 
| only affect that process and child processes, but not an independent R 
| process launched from a shell like you seem to be doing here:

Yes. That is somewhat common, if obscure, knowledge by those bitten before.

Maybe a line or two could be / should be added to the docs to that effect?

| How to set environment variables is system-specific. On a Unix-like 
| system, you could use the command
| 
| _R_CHECK_DEPENDS_ONLY_=true  R CMD check qra_0.2.4.tar.gz
| 
| to set the environment variable for this R process.
| See, e.g., https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environment_variable.

R does have hooks for this, I had these for a few years now:

  ~/.R/check.Renviron
  ~/.R/check.Renviron-Rdevel

Again, might be worthwhile documenting it in the Inst+Admin manual (if it
isn' already, I don't recall right now).

Dirk

-- 
https://dirk.eddelbuettel.com | @eddelbuettel | edd at debian.org