R help - May 2005 - pdf error msg

I get the following error message when trying to start a pdf file:

 > pdf("hi.pdf")
Error in PDF(file, old$family, old$encoding, old$bg, old$fg, width, 
height,  :
	unable to start device pdf
In addition: Warning message:
cannot open `pdf' file argument `hi.pdf'
*** malloc[477]: Deallocation of a pointer not malloced: 0x143cf5c0; 
This could be a double free(), or free() called with the middle of an 
allocated block; Try setting environment variable MallocHelp to see 
tools to help debug

          _
platform powerpc-apple-darwin6.8
arch     powerpc
os       darwin6.8
system   powerpc, darwin6.8
status
major    2
minor    0.0
year     2004
month    10
day      04
language R

 > sessionInfo()
R version 2.0.0, 2004-10-04, powerpc-apple-darwin6.8

attached base packages:
[1] "tools"     "methods"   "stats"    
"graphics"  "grDevices" "utils"
     "datasets"  "base"

other attached packages:
     convert     seanlib      gplots       gdata      gtools geneplotter 
    annotate     Biobase      marray       limma   firstlook
     "1.1.9"       "1.0"     "2.0.0"    
"2.0.0"     "2.0.0"     "1.4.3"
     "1.5.1"    "1.4.22"    "1.5.24"    
"1.8.1"       "1.4"

Matt McCall

On Tue, 31 May 2005, Matt McCall wrote:
> I get the following error message when trying to start a pdf file:
>
>> pdf("hi.pdf")
> Error in PDF(file, old$family, old$encoding, old$bg, old$fg, width, height,
> :
> 	unable to start device pdf
> In addition: Warning message:
> cannot open `pdf' file argument `hi.pdf'
In my experience, when R can't open pdf output file it is usually either 
because the file is locked by eg Acrobat or because you don't have write 
permission to the current directory.  The Mac's Preview program doesn't 
lock pdf files it is displaying, so the first explanation may not apply.

> *** malloc[477]: Deallocation of a pointer not malloced: 0x143cf5c0; This 
> could be a double free(), or free() called with the middle of an allocated 
> block; Try setting environment variable MallocHelp to see tools to help
debug
That, on the other hand, does definitely sound like a bug.

 	-thomas

Thomas Lumley			Assoc. Professor, Biostatistics
tlumley at u.washington.edu	University of Washington, Seattle

On Tue, 31 May 2005, Matt McCall wrote:
> *** malloc[477]: Deallocation of a pointer not malloced: 0x143cf5c0; This 
> could be a double free(), or free() called with the middle of an allocated 
> block; Try setting environment variable MallocHelp to see tools to help
debug
>
And this is a double free(). It looks as though the function for creating 
a PDF device used not to free the passed-in structure in case of error, 
but it now does.

Thanks for reporting this.

 	-thomas