I have a shiny project built under R version 3.6. I used renv to make sure an identical version of packages installed when I move a project from one system to another system. However, the problem arose when I updated R from 3.6 to the latest 4.1. I wonder, how can I install the same versions of packages which were previously installed in version 3.6. ? I tried using renv::restore() But no success.
P.S. : My shiny project also includes several packages from R bioconductor version 3.9.
I do have similar concerns in the future.
I heard about golem but I believe this requires some changes to your 3,6 code in order for it to be transferable. What golem does is essentially freeze all the packages inside the Shiny app so the versions do not change.
You cant ensure 100% that future versions of the rlanguage won't break backwards compatibility with older package versions. But renv records the rversion used for the app, so you can always install the appropriate r version along with r version packages for a given app...