My students do NOT need git, and also don't want to download and install XCode. One of them tried to do this, and it failed.
Anyone who can tell me how I can tell RStudio that it should stop looking for git? This is on Big Sur, with the latest version of RStudio ( 2021.09.2+382). I'd prefer a solution that doesn't require downloading tools these students don't need.
EDIT: The message pops up when opening RStudio on a fresh install. I have tried to uninstall/reinstall RStudio, turn off git/SVN in the global options, but that didnt't help.
I could get rid of it on one Mac by installing xcode-select from the terminal, but I'd like to avoid this.
You haven't said anything about the context on which you get that error message but you usually get that when you are trying to install a package that is only available to you in source form and requires compiling. Precompiled binaries for R packages are only available for the latest R versions and a few days after a new package version is out.
If this is your case, then tell your students to choose installing packages from binaries when given the option, even if the version is a little older, and to update to the latest R version to avoid this situation as much as possible.
Apologies. The error message pops up when opening RStudio on a fresh install. I have been struggling with this last year as well, but eventually got it resolved. I was surprised to see the problem pop up again and forgot how I solved it.