From Martin Maechler <maechler@stat.math.ethz.ch>  Wed May 13 08:07:09 1998
From: Martin Maechler <maechler@stat.math.ethz.ch> (Martin Maechler)
Date: Wed, 13 May 1998 09:07:09 +0200
Subject: readline installation [Re: R-beta: ....]]
Message-ID: <199805130707.JAA10115@sophie.ethz.ch>

I think, we should give more hints on installing / using readline with R.

Maybe there could be one ASCII file
	README-readline-Installation

added to the FTP sites  *and* to R-0.61.3.tar.gz
explaining some the things  Peter Dalgaard just said on R-help.

I agree with Jan that it's a pity for non-programmer-hackers  if they won't
be able to use readline (most probably, these are the ones who will not be
using ESS [= Emacs Speaks Statistics] either!),
or even they won't even realize that there readline *was* available.

Further, for R 0.62, I think we should try quite a bit harder to
have configure searching around for the readline library and include files.
[[maybe, yet again look more closely at what octave does?]]

Martin

----------------

FYI, I got the following, yesterday, privately.

>> Date: Tue, 12 May 1998 10:28:09 +0200 (MET DST)
>> From: Jan Kutylowski <janku@ifi.uio.no>
>> To: maechler@stat.math.ethz.ch
>> CC: ajanku@ulrik.uio.nox
>> In-reply-to: message from Martin Maechler on Fri, 8 May 1998 14:40:28 +0200
>> Subject: Re: R-beta: [ajanku@ulrik.uio.no: R-0.61.3 with readline]

>> MM> This was accidentally sent to 
>> MM> R-help-owner instead of R-help  
>> 
>> thanks for forwarding it
>> 
>> MM> [why on earth ??]
>> 
>> People desperate for command line editing will do about everything to get
>> help after a local guru cannot decipher bysantine intricacies of the
>> makefiles in the current distribution. They will write to the White House,
>> contact scientology, whatever, they may even  come across an old e-mail
>> message and when they see R ... here they go.
>> 
##>> More seriously, this feature of R is so basic that it must be better
##>> documented. Current functionality of R deserves attraction from a broader
##>> range of users than those who can figure out how to modify a particular
##>> piece of one of the many makefiles.
>> 
>> I hope you will find my comment useful.
>> 
>> A. Jan Kutylowski




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readline installation [Re: R-beta: ....]]
Martin Maechler