Question

Background

I am creating a newpackage that depends on oldpackage, and have indicated this dependency in the file newpackage/DESCRIPTION.

Furthermore,

• oldpackage is installed in the directory, ~/lib/R

• my .Rprofile includes .libPaths("~/lib/R")

  • hence, I can successfully load oldpackage without specifying the library location, e.g., using the command library(oldpackage) in R

Despite the ability to load the package without having its library specified, R CMD check newpackage gives an error indicating that it can not fine oldpackage:

checking whether the package can be loaded ... ERROR 
Loading required package: oldpackage
Error: package 'oldpackage' could not be loaded
In addition: Warning message:
In library(pkg, character.only = TRUE, logical.return = TRUE, lib.loc = lib.loc) :
  there is no package called 'oldpackage'
Execution halted


It looks like this package has a loading problem: see the messages for
    details.

Questions:

1. Why is R unable to find the package?

2. Can I specify the library location in the DESCRIPTION file?

Answer 1

Regarding question 1), it is both a FAQ and yet somewhat annoying. R CMD check runs in vanilla mode, so it will not find user-level libraries. As I recall, setting R_LIBS=”….” in the call helps, so try that.

Regarding question 2), no you cannot give a location in DESCRIPTION. Which makes sense as that file needs to work ‘everywhere’ whereas your location info is local to your machine.