R 2.12 to 2.13 package upgrade

If you:

  • use Linux
  • have just upgraded your R installation from 2.12 to 2.13
  • installed some/all of your packages in your home area (e.g. ~/R/i486-pc-linux-gnu-library/2.12) and…
  • …are wondering why R can’t see them any more

just do this:

# at a shell prompt
cp -r ~/R/i486-pc-linux-gnu-library/2.12 ~/R/i486-pc-linux-gnu-library/2.13
# in R console
update.packages(checkBuilt=TRUE, ask=FALSE)
# back to the shell
rm -rf ~/R/i486-pc-linux-gnu-library/2.12

update: corrected a typo; of course you need “cp -r”

9 thoughts on “R 2.12 to 2.13 package upgrade”

  1. Pingback: How to upgrade R on windows 7 | R-statistics blog

  3. Eric

    Put the first command into the Ubuntu terminal. Then opened RStudio and typed the second command you specified into console. It comes back with the following error:

    > update.packages(checkBuilt=TRUE, ask=FALSE)

    Warning in install.packages(update[instlib == l, “Package”], l, contriburl = contriburl, :
    ‘lib = “/usr/lib/R/library”‘ is not writable
    Error in install.packages(update[instlib == l, “Package”], l, contriburl = contriburl, :
    unable to install packages
    >

    1. nsaunders Post author

      The error occurs because you have to be the root user to install packages in /usr/lib/R. The procedure that I outlined applies only for packages in your home directory ($HOME/R). If you don’t have packages in that location, you don’t have to worry about upgrading. If you have some packages in $HOME/R and some in /usr/lib/R, you don’t have to worry about the error: the procedure will upgrade those in $HOME/R and leave the others alone.

      If you want to write to packages in /usr/lib/R, you need to start R as root (“sudo R”).

  4. Eric

    If I look in HOME/R, I see a folder i486-pc-linux-gnu-library. If open that folder, I see three folders 2.10, 2.12, 2.13. I see folders inside the 2.12 folder with the names of all the packages I am looking for. If I open the 2.13 folder, it’s empty. I also went to /usr/lib/R and didn’t see any of the packages I’m missing.

    Based on your comment that the procedure will upgrade the packages in R/HOME, I went into RStudio console and tried a require command and got the following error

    > require(quantmod)
    Loading required package: quantmod
    Warning message:
    In library(package, lib.loc = lib.loc, character.only = TRUE, logical.return = TRUE, :
    there is no package called ‘quantmod’

    Any suggestions on what I should do now ?

    1. nsaunders Post author

      If the 2.13 directory is empty, then you have not successfully copied the contents of 2.12/ to 2.13/, as per the first line of the upgrade procedure. Which, I notice from my instructions is my fault! The correct command is “cp -r”, not just “cp”.

      So basically, just make sure everything inside 2.12/ is copied to 2.13/, then try again.

  5. Eric

    During the initial process, I executed the 3rd line of your code. I looks like that wiped out the 2.12. folder. Is there anything I can do other than just start installing each package again ?

    1. nsaunders Post author

      Nope. Installation from scratch is now the only way, I’m afraid. You need to be careful with “rm -rf”, it’s not very forgiving :-)

  6. Eric

    Sorry it didn’t work out. But thanks very much for walking me through and the fast response.

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