Rolf, A few quick points as I just noticed this thread (as I don't regularly dip into r-help any more):
1) You really do not need to builds R locally on Ubuntu. I update the Debian package hours after Peter cuts a release. Michael rolls Ubuntu releases off these typically the same or next day, which arrive at CRAN in less than 72 hours after a release. See https://cloud.r-project.org/bin/linux/ubuntu/README.html I run these binaries myself on several personal machines and dozens more at work. They. Just. Work. Why not take advantage of a freebie? 2) If you still want to build locally, simply copy what we do. Our sources are public. The debian/control for r-base (for Debian, albeit, don't have Michael's here but tcl/tk has not changed in year) has Build-Depends: gcc (>= 4:4.1.0), [...], tcl8.6-dev, tk8.6-dev, [...] so make sure you install those two package, and the debian/rules does ./configure --prefix=/usr \ [....] --with-tcltk \ [....] [...] $(MAKE) [...] ie nothing special for configure or make. My most recent build then logged checking for tclConfig.sh... no checking for tclConfig.sh in library (sub)directories... /usr/lib/tcl8.6/tclConfig.sh checking for tkConfig.sh... no checking for tkConfig.sh in library (sub)directories... /usr/lib/tk8.6/tkConfig.sh checking tcl.h usability... yes checking tcl.h presence... yes checking for tcl.h... yes checking tk.h usability... yes checking tk.h presence... yes checking for tk.h... yes checking whether compiling/linking Tcl/Tk code works... yes which echos what Peter already said. Its final state report for configure was R is now configured for x86_64-pc-linux-gnu Source directory: . Installation directory: /usr C compiler: gcc -std=gnu99 -g -O2 -fdebug-prefix-map=/build/r-base-3.4.2=. -fstack-protector-strong -Wformat -Werror=format-security -Wdate-time -D_FORTIFY_SOURCE=2 -g Fortran 77 compiler: gfortran -g -O2 -fdebug-prefix-map=/build/r-base-3.4.2=. -fstack-protector-strong Default C++ compiler: g++ -g -O2 -fdebug-prefix-map=/build/r-base-3.4.2=. -fstack-protector-strong -Wformat -Werror=format-security -Wdate-time -D_FORTIFY_SOURCE=2 -g C++98 compiler: g++ -std=gnu++98 -g -O2 -fdebug-prefix-map=/build/r-base-3.4.2=. -fstack-protector-strong -Wformat -Werror=format-security -Wdate-time -D_FORTIFY_SOURCE=2 -g C++11 compiler: g++ -std=gnu++11 -g -O2 -fdebug-prefix-map=/build/r-base-3.4.2=. -fstack-protector-strong -Wformat -Werror=format-security -Wdate-time -D_FORTIFY_SOURCE=2 -g C++14 compiler: g++ -g -O2 -fdebug-prefix-map=/build/r-base-3.4.2=. -fstack-protector-strong -Wformat -Werror=format-security -Wdate-time -D_FORTIFY_SOURCE=2 -g C++17 compiler: g++ -std=gnu++17 -g -O2 -fdebug-prefix-map=/build/r-base-3.4.2=. -fstack-protector-strong -Wformat -Werror=format-security -Wdate-time -D_FORTIFY_SOURCE=2 -g Fortran 90/95 compiler: gfortran -g -O2 -fdebug-prefix-map=/build/r-base-3.4.2=. -fstack-protector-strong Obj-C compiler: Interfaces supported: X11, tcltk External libraries: readline, BLAS(generic), LAPACK(generic), curl Additional capabilities: PNG, JPEG, TIFF, NLS, cairo, ICU Options enabled: shared R library, R profiling, memory profiling Capabilities skipped: Options not enabled: shared BLAS Recommended packages: no which looks pretty good to me. No capabilities. All batteries included. (And rec'd packages is no as we package them individually). 3) r-help is the wrong list for these questions. Come to r-sig-debian which covers R on .deb based systems. We don't bite, and it is low volume Cheers, Dirk -- http://dirk.eddelbuettel.com | @eddelbuettel | e...@debian.org ______________________________________________ R-help@r-project.org mailing list -- To UNSUBSCRIBE and more, see https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.