I have a few R packages installed under ~/R/i486-pc-linux-gnu-library/2.11.
I would like to make them, and any other R package I install from now on, available to all R users. I don't mind re-installing the packages I already have in a neutral place (they are just a few). So how do I do that?
Change permissions in the default library. Try .libPaths() to see folders where R saves packages by default. I'm using Arch Linux, and in my case it's:
> .libPaths()
[1] "/usr/lib/R/library"
But if you're running Ubuntu, you're probably going to get several folders. However, you need to run from terminal:
sudo chmod -R a+rw /usr/lib/R/library/
or from R:
system("sudo chmod -R a+rw /usr/lib/R/library/")
...for each folder, or you can do (from R):
for (i in 1:length(.libPaths())) {
system(paste("sudo chmod -R a+rw", .libPaths()[i]))
}
...and change them all with one blow.
chmod changes permissions of the files/folders, -R is for recursion, a+rw means: a ll can r ead + w rite, and then you point to the file/folder.aL3xa gives (IMHO) bad advice. Do not mess with /usr which is handled by the package management system. Instead, use the facility provided by /usr/local/lib/R/site-library.
That latter directory is already searched by default. All you need to do is to add yourself to group staff as that group has write-rights there -- try adduser yourid staff where yourid is your user name on the system. Afterwards you should be able to install there without problems.
Another thing you may like on Ubuntu is apt-get install littler and then use the install.r and upgrade.r helper scripts from the examples directory. I use them all the time.
aL3xa answer is wrong; you shouldn't expose those directories to write for all users.
Run R as a root (probably using sudo R) and then install packages as usual -- they will be placed in a global library and will be available for all users.