I have been unsuccessfully trying to install the latest version (2.15.2) of r-base. Apparently, R package Rcpp would not install for R version 2.14.1 - the version that installs for me.

I am not sure what/how/where to change my installation attempts which appear below. Please note that I am using ubuntu-12.04.1-server-i386.

The current installed version is R version 2.14.1 (2011-12-22):

$ sudo apt-get install r-base
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
r-base is already the newest version.

Including version information doesn't help:

$ sudo apt-get install r-base=2.15.1-5ubuntu1
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
E: Version '2.15.1-5ubuntu1' for 'r-base' was not found

Changes based on CRAN Ubuntu instructions from :

1. Added to /etc/apt/sources.list

   deb quantal/

2. Update and install

   $ sudo apt-get update
   $ sudo apt-get install r-base
   Reading package lists... Done
   Building dependency tree
   Reading state information... Done
   Some packages could not be installed. This may mean that you have
   requested an impossible situation or if you are using the unstable
   distribution that some required packages have not yet been created
   or been moved out of Incoming.
   The following information may help to resolve the situation:
   The following packages have unmet dependencies: r-base : Depends: r-base-core (>= 2.15.2-1quantal2) but it is not going to be installed Depends: r-recommended (= 2.15.2-1quantal2) but it is not going to be installed Recommends: r-base-html but it is not going to be installed
   E: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages.

3

5 Answers

None of the above worked for me so I am copying the answer from

Uninstall old R:

sudo apt-get remove r-base-core

Then:

sudo add-apt-repository "deb $(lsb_release -sc)/"

Then copy/paste these commands into the command line:

sudo apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv-keys E298A3A825C0D65DFD57CBB651716619E084DAB9
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:marutter/rdev
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade
sudo apt-get install r-base

Which worked for me

6

Here's how I did it;

As already mentioned in the question, I went through the steps in UBUNTU PACKAGES FOR R instructions to add the repository, and did a apt-get update, and then

apt-cache showpkg r-base 

which would give something like

Package: r-base
Versions:
3.0.2-1raring0 (/var/lib/apt/lists/cran.rstudio.com_bin_linux_ubuntu_raring_Packages) Description Language: File: /var/lib/apt/lists/cran.rstudio.com_bin_linux_ubuntu_raring_Packages MD5: 5787ca79ed716232c4cc2087ed9b425b
3.0.1-6raring0 (/var/lib/apt/lists/cran.rstudio.com_bin_linux_ubuntu_raring_Packages) Description Language: File: /var/lib/apt/lists/cran.rstudio.com_bin_linux_ubuntu_raring_Packages MD5: 5787ca79ed716232c4cc2087ed9b425b

and the I did a

 sudo apt-get install -f r-base=3.0.2-1raring0

and done.

open the terminal and type sudo -s. Then open source.list by typing:

gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

then, add these lines to the file:

deb quetzal/

then save& exit gedit. In the terminal type

gpg --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv-key E298A3A825C0D65DFD57CBB651716619E084DAB9
gpg -a --export E298A3A825C0D65DFD57CBB651716619E084DAB9| sudo apt-key add -

then type

exit

then type these commands --one line at a time--.

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install r-base
sudo apt-get install r-base-dev

1

In my system (without R installed) that versions installs correctly. So maybe the best option is to uninstall the old R and install the newer, passing the specific version you want. But before you do that, make a backup of your operating system. It can be difficult to reinstall old the packages after you remove them.

Also just a note: if you do sudo apt-get install r-base=2.15.1-5ubuntu1 it will not find a package because the version is wrong. In that repo, the files are named, for example r-base_2.15.2-1quantal2_all.deb, so the correct version should be r-base=2.15.2-1quantal2 or r-base=2.15.2-1quantal2_all, for example.

Hope this helps.

One thing I noticed, if you follow instructions on various R-websites, these will make you add a line to the Linux sources list /etc/apt/sources.list

See, for example, this link:

However, some Linux distros add a line to a separate file in this folder:/etc/apt/sources.list.d

This can lead to the you have held broken packages error message.

I commented-out the line (/etc/apt/sources.list) in /etc/apt/sources.list, and added the correct R-repository using the Software Sources manager of my distro (Linux Mint 18.3)

This solved the problem.

1