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Patricio Moracho
Asked: 2020-02-05 10:43:50 +0800 CST 2020-02-05 10:43:50 +0800 CST

Is it possible to use a non-standard package in Repl.it?

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repl.itis an excellent, useful and for now free tool for executing R code online. However, I have difficulties using non-standard R packages. In fact, when I try to install something, the following happens:

install.packages("vegan")

Installing package into ‘/usr/local/lib/R/site-library’
(as ‘lib’ is unspecified)
Warning in install.packages("vegan") :
  'lib = "/usr/local/lib/R/site-library"' is not writable
Error in install.packages("vegan") : unable to install packages

In the documentation , it is only mentioned that it is possible to install other libraries or packages in the case of Python, Javascriptor Ruby.

Is there a way to be able to use packages outside of the base distribution in this tool?

r

1 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    Not in a standard way, that is, by means of a simple: install.packages("vegan"). The mistake is clear. We do not have write permission on the folder where the new package would go.

    Solving this is possible but a bit complex, let's see:

    • First of all you have to install the packages in a folder in which we have write permissions
    • Then we will have to make it libraryuse this folder to find the installed package
    • Additionally, another problem is that we will not be able to automatically install the dependencies, that is, if a package Arequires a package B, Awe can install it in a suitable folder, but the Bdefault will be installed in the one in which we do not have permissions. The solution in this case is to install the dependencies one by one.

    For example, if we need the package vegan, we must first install its dependencies, in this case the package permute. We can use the user's folder home, where we have the proper permissions to do this:

    install.packages("permute", lib = ".")
install.packages("vegan", lib = ".")

    Then, yes, we can load them, but we must indicate the location of these libraries:

    library("permute", lib.loc = ".")
library("vegan", lib.loc = ".")

    secondary observation

    I add, that another alternative could be: https://rstudio.cloud, for now it is free access, through a secure login with an account of googleor github. What it offers you is a rstudiofully functional and online. Installing and using new packages is exactly the same as you would from a rstudiolocal.

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