R-build is an Renv plugin that provides an Renv install command to compile and install different versions of R on UNIX-like systems.

You can also use R-build without Renv in environments where you need precise control over R version installation.

Installing R-build as an Renv plugin will give you access to the Renv install command.

$ mkdir -p ~/.Renv/plugins
$ cd ~/.Renv/plugins
$ git clone git://github.com/viking/R-build.git

This will install the latest development version of R-build into the ~/.Renv/plugins/R-build directory. From that directory, you can check out a specific release tag. To update R-build, run git pull to download the latest changes.

Installing R-build as a standalone program will give you access to the R-build command for precise control over R version installation. If you have Renv installed, you will also be able to use the Renv install command.

$ git clone git://github.com/viking/R-build.git
$ cd R-build
$ ./install.sh

This will install R-build into /usr/local. If you do not have write permission to /usr/local, you will need to run sudo ./install.sh instead. You can install to a different prefix by setting the PREFIX environment variable.

To update R-build after it has been installed, run git pull in your cloned copy of the repository, then re-run the install script.

To install a R version for use with Renv, run Renv install with the exact name of the version you want to install. For example,

$ Renv install 2.15.2

installs R version 2.15.2 to ~/.Renv/versions/2.15.2. Provide an additional argument to install to a directory with a name that differs from the version number. For example,

$ Renv install 2.15.2 my-proj

installs R version 2.15.2 to ~/.Renv/versions/my-proj.

To see a list of all available R versions, run Renv install without any arguments. You may also tab-complete available R versions if your Renv installation is properly configured.

If you have installed R-build as a standalone program, you can use the R-build command to compile and install R versions into specific locations.

Run the R-build command with the exact name of the version you want to install and the full path where you want to install it. For example,

$ R-build 2.15.2 ~/local/R-2.15.2

To see a list of all available R versions, run R-build --definitions.

Pass the -v or --verbose flag to R-build as the first argument to see what's happening under the hood.

Both Renv install and R-build accept a path to a custom definition file in place of a version name. Custom definitions let you develop and install versions of R that are not yet supported by R-build.

See the R-build built-in definitions as a starting point for custom definition files.

You can set certain environment variables to control the build process.

• TMPDIR sets the location where R-build stores temporary files.
• R_BUILD_BUILD_PATH sets the location in which sources are downloaded and built. By default, this is a subdirectory of TMPDIR.
• CC sets the path to the C compiler.
• CONFIGURE_OPTS lets you pass additional options to ./configure.
• MAKE_OPTS (or MAKEOPTS) lets you pass additional options to make.

Both R-build and Renv install accept the -k or --keep flag, which tells R-build to keep the downloaded source after installation. This can be useful if you need to use gdb and memprof with R.

Source code will be kept in a parallel directory tree ~/.Renv/sources when using --keep with the Renv install command. You should specify the location of the source code with the R_BUILD_BUILD_PATH environment variable when using --keep with R-build.

Open an issue on the issue tracker. Be sure to include the full build log for build failures.

R-build is a forked version of ruby-build.

• Add definition for R-2.15.2
• Fix merging errors

• Add definition for R-2.15.1

• Add definition for R-2.15.0

• Add definition for R-2.14.2

• Began fork from R-build
• Added definitions for the R-2 series

(The MIT License)

Copyright (c) 2011 Sam Stephenson

Copyright (c) 2012 Vanderbilt University

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