makeRepo {miniCRAN}

Downloads packages from CRAN to specified path and creates a local repository.

Description

Given a list of packages, downloads these packages to a specified destination folder using the required CRAN folder structure, and finally creates the PACKAGES index file. Since the folder structure mimics the required structure and files of a CRAN repository, it supports functions like utils::install.packages().

Usage

makeRepo(
  pkgs,
  path,
  repos = getOption("repos"),
  type = "source",
  Rversion = R.version,
  download = TRUE,
  writePACKAGES = TRUE,
  quiet = FALSE
)

updateRepoIndex(path, type = "source", Rversion = R.version)

Arguments

pkgs

Character vector of packages to download

path

Destination download path. This path is the root folder of your new repository.

repos

URL(s) of the 'contrib' sections of the repositories, e.g. "https://cran.us.r-project.org". Passed to available.packages()

type

Possible values are (currently) "source", "mac.binary" and "win.binary": the binary types can be listed and downloaded but not installed on other platforms. Passed to download.packages().

Rversion

Version of R (only used if type is not source.) Defaults to R.version, but this can be specified as any of the following formats:

• a character string with the two digit R version, e.g. "3.1"

• a list with components major and minor

• the result of getRversion()

• the result of R.version

download

If TRUE downloads packages.

writePACKAGES

If TRUE, calls write_PACKAGES() to update the repository PACKAGES file.

quiet

If TRUE, suppress status messages (if any), and the progress bar during download.

Value

character vector of downloaded package files

Repo folder structure

A repository has two main folders, one for source packages, and the other for binary packages. Inside the binary package folder, bin, you will find subfolders for Windows as well as the various OSX binaries.

+- Root

...+- src/contrib

......+- PACKAGES

..+- bin

.......+- windows/contrib/version

..........+- PACKAGES

.......+- macosx/contrib/version

..........+- PACKAGES

.......+- macosx/mavericks/contrib/version

..........+- PACKAGES

.......+- macosx/leopard/contrib/version

..........+- PACKAGES

Note

Internally makes use of utils::download.packages() and write_PACKAGES()

See Also

Other update repo functions: addOldPackage(), addPackage(), checkVersions(), updatePackages()

Examples

# Specify list of packages to download
mirror <- c(CRAN = "https://cloud.r-project.org")
pkgs <- c("foreach")

if (interactive()) {
  pdb <- cranJuly2014
  
  pdb <- pkgAvail(
    repos = c(CRAN = getOption("minicran.mran")),
    type = "source"
  )
  
  pkgList <- pkgDep(pkgs, availPkgs = pdb, repos = mirror,
                    type = "source", suggests = FALSE)
  pkgList
  
  
  # Create temporary folder for miniCRAN
  dir.create(pth <- file.path(tempdir(), "miniCRAN"))
  
  # Make repo for source and win.binary
  makeRepo(pkgList, path = pth, repos = mirror, type = "source")
  
  # List all files in miniCRAN
  list.files(pth, recursive = TRUE)
  
  # Check for available packages
  pkgAvail(repos = pth, type = "source")
  
  # Repeat process for windows binaries
  makeRepo(pkgList, path = pth, repos = mirror, type = "win.binary")
  pkgAvail(repos = pth, type = "win.binary")
  
  # Delete temporary folder
  unlink(pth, recursive = TRUE)
}