[ESS] Emacs finding "R" on Windows {was "Release of ESS 5.3.5"}

[Martin Maechler]

>>>>> "PL" == Phillip Lord <phillip.lord at newcastle.ac.uk>
>>>>>     on Fri, 24 Aug 2007 16:13:00 +0100 writes:

>>>>> "SE" == Stephen Eglen <S.J.Eglen at damtp.cam.ac.uk> writes:
    SE> Yes, I agree -- if users do not have to touch PATH on windows, this is
    SE> one less thing for the new user to do.

    >>> http://www.ourcomments.org/Emacs/EmacsW32Util.html
    >>> 
    >>> I don't know how widely used this is among the ESS or Emacs on Windows
    >>> community in general.
    SE> Certainly new to me, but I'm no windows user...

    PL> I think that it's a lovely package. Getting printing with GS, and ispell and
    PL> all of that stuff used to be a pain. 

    PL> The only package I am using `w32-regiface' is very small and has no
    PL> dependencies on the rest of Emacs W32 so could just be included with ESS. I've
    PL> attached it. In the original code I sent, I had incorrectly require'd
    PL> w32-regdat (which require regiface). 


Thank you, Phillip!
But I think it still does require   

  (defvar w32-reg-iface-prog-name "w32-reg-iface.exe"
    "Name of the registry interface program.")

which we can not easily include with ESS
(maybe we could, if we'd also distribute it's source (C ?) code
 along ?).

I'm thinking we should wait till Emacs comes equipped natively
with some (E-lisp) API to the registry ..
Otherwise, we may get into another maintenance nightmare.


    >>> Well, just as a start, this returns the latest R version if you are using
    >>> EmacsW32 and have not told R not to modify the registry.

    SE> (Reading the double negative in this, I presume this means that by
    SE> default, when installing R, it will modify the registry?).

    PL> Well, I had to uninistall R to confirm. Yes, it's the default, although the
    PL> user is asked (on the last step of the install) and can remove it. Also, if
    PL> you uninstall, R removes it, so it won't pick up an old uninstalled version.


    PL> Phil

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