CODEWITHSUNDEEP
rdependenciespackageloadingcran
Qbik
Qbik

Reputation: 6147

How force R to load package, `library()` fails due to dependency?

How force R to load package when some (not crucial) packages it depends on aren't installed ?

Motivation : sometimes I have to use R in places, where I can't automatically install required packages. Doing so manually is very time consuming and in most cases I need only a vary small part of functions contained in installed package.

Typical message error in this case is :

> library(packageX)
Loading required package: packageY
Error: package ‘packageY’ could not be loaded
In addition: Warning messages:
In library(pkg, character.only = TRUE, logical.return = TRUE, lib.loc = lib.loc) : there is no package called ‘packageY’

Mayby 'devtools' package will be helpful. But I haven't investigate it.

Upvotes: 3

Views: 2302

Answers (2)

Greg Snow
Greg Snow

Reputation: 49640

You can look at the source of the package to figure out which functions you need and what dependencies they need. You may want to collaborate with the author/maintainer of the package on this part. You could create a private version of the package that does not have the dependencies and the other functionality that you don't need.

If this is only for your personal use and the license for the package allows it (gpl and similar) then you don't need the authors permission to extract those pieces you want. If you want to link your package to this for distribution then you should work with the original author. I know a couple of package authors wanted just a couple of functions from one of my packages and I agreed that loading my entire package (and dependencies) was overkill for what they wanted to do, so I worked with them and they have copies of the functions in their package without needing to depend on mine. When I update one of the functions I send a copy to them to update their copy as well.

Upvotes: 1

GSee
GSee

Reputation: 49810

If you cannot install the dependencies, I think your only option is to remove those packages from the Depends field of DESCRIPTION file of packageX and try to rebuild packageX

Upvotes: 2

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