R help - Jun 2007 - Upgraded FC4 to FC5 - unable to start device X11 in R

Hi,

I upgraded my system from FC4 to FC5.  So now I have R version 2.5.0 
(2007-04-23).
But I ran into a problem with starting device X11 (message below).

 > X11()
can't find X11 font
Error in X11(display, width, height, pointsize, if (is.null(gamma)) 1 
else gamma,  :
        unable to start device X11

Any idea?

Thanks,
L.

-- 
Li-Jung Liang, Ph.D.
Department of Biostatistics
UCLA School of Public Health
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1772

On Fri, 2007-06-15 at 13:50 -0700, Li-Jung Liang wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I upgraded my system from FC4 to FC5.  So now I have R version 2.5.0 
> (2007-04-23).
> But I ran into a problem with starting device X11 (message below).
> 
>  > X11()
> can't find X11 font
> Error in X11(display, width, height, pointsize, if (is.null(gamma)) 1 
> else gamma,  :
>         unable to start device X11
> 
> Any idea?
> 
> Thanks,
> L.
Sounds like either you did not install some font related RPMS during
your 'upgrade' or your xorg.conf file has perhaps become corrupted
relative to defining font paths.

Check as 'root':

 # yum list xorg-x11-fonts*

and see what it returns.

How did you install R?  Using the RPMS from CRAN or from Fedora Extras?

Also, note that FC5 will reach EOL (End of Life) on June 29, which means
that you will receive no further updates (security, bug fixes, etc)
after that date.  You should really consider upgrading to FC6. 

F7 just came out and I am running it, but I would recommend that typical
users wait a while before doing so to give it time to stabilize.

HTH,

Marc Schwartz

On Fri, 15-Jun-2007 at 01:50PM -0700, Li-Jung Liang wrote:

|> Hi,
|> 
|> I upgraded my system from FC4 to FC5.  So now I have R version 2.5.0 
|> (2007-04-23).
|> But I ran into a problem with starting device X11 (message below).
|> 
|>  > X11()
|> can't find X11 font
|> Error in X11(display, width, height, pointsize, if (is.null(gamma)) 1 
|> else gamma,  :
|>         unable to start device X11
|> 
|> Any idea?

Check what search() gives you.  Make sure package:grDevices is on that
list.

I ran into that problem myself.  I never figured out how come it used
to be there, but suddenly ceased to be.  The problem didn't appear
until R-2.5.0.  In the USER-VISIBLE CHANGES under 
CHANGES IN R VERSION 2.0.0,
I see this:

    o	Package 'graphics' has been split into 'grDevices' (the
graphics
	devices shared between base and grid graphics) and 'graphics'
	(base graphics).  Each of the 'graphics' and 'grid' packages
	load 'grDevices' when they are attached.  Note that
	ps.options() has been moved to grDevices and user hooks may
	need to be updated.

My suspicion is that grDevices did not have to be specifically loaded
if graphics was one of your default packages loaded at startup.  Since
few others seem to have had the same experience, I'd hesitate to call
it a bug.  I've got round the problem by adding grDevices to the list
in my ~/.Rprofile file.

Others might have a better explanation, of course.

HTH


-- 
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