Hello all. I am able to install a package (in zip format) on my windows desktop without issues in Rstudio. The package in question was given to me under licence and is not available freely online so I am not able to share it. I am looking to migrate to linux on my old macbook due to the impending windows 10 issues. I use Manjaro and have installed rstudio from the AUR without issues. However, when I attempt to install the same package I get the following error:
Error in rawToChar(block[seq_len(ns)]) :
embedded nul in string: 'PK\003\004\n\0\0\0\0\0\024\x95RT\0\0\0\0\0\0\0\0\0\0\0\0\004\0\0\0fgr/PK\003\004\n\0\0\0\0\0\022\x95RT\0\0\0\0\0\0\0\0\0\0\0\0\t\0\0\0fgr/data/PK\003\004\024\0\002\0\b\0\022\x95RT\xc1\xdeҋ]R\003\0\x90|\003\0\022'
I have tried extracting and re-compressing the package files as both zip and tar.gz but without luck. I have also tried installing on Ubuntu in a VM to see if this was an arch rstudio issue but get the same error. I also tried installing the dev tools for rstudio but after a lengthy install process the program closes due to running out of memory.
I have asked the organisation that shared the package for assistance but any help would be appreciated.
Was the package provided to you as source code (to be compiled during installation) or as binary code (which is likely to be OS and/or architecture - specific)?
It states " Binary packages for macOS are stored as .tgz, whereas Windows binary packages end in .zip"
So perhaps I have a binary package already compiled for windows? Do I need to request that the package provider is willing to send the source code so I can compile for linux or perhaps they would be willing to compile? Its not something Ive done before but at least if that's the issue I can start looking into how to do it
If the extracted stuff contains a file named "src" (likely containing .c or .cpp files), you have source code. Whether it will compile properly on a Linux system remains to be seen. (It depends in part on whether they used any Windows-specific stuff, but there's at least a decent chance you can get it to work with Linux.) If there are directories named "bin" or "libs", possibly containing .dll files, then it is likely to be a binary compiled for Windows. In that case, yes, you will need the licensor to provide either source code or (preferably) a version compiled for Linux (along with a list of any Linux system libraries you might need).
If the package is indeed a Windows binary, there's one other possibility that may or may not work for you. You can install the "wine" package under Linux. It allows you to run many Windows programs. Then install Windows versions of R and (if necessary) RStudio, followed by the supplied package, and hope for the best. You will be restricted to using it only when running R/RStudio under wine.