Support remote R session (located in a different machine)

[Tal500]

The user can run remote R session on a different machine by controlling R_app, R_cmd and R_args global vars.
However, I suppose because the nvim-R communication uses also the filesystem (on temporary dir), it fails to connect to a remote machine hosting the R session.

Since Nvim-R uses already TCP to connect between process, why do we need also a file for that?

Do you think it's possible to have cross-machine communication?
For reference, this is my PR doing much more work than probably needed here on the VSCode-R extension: REditorSupport/vscode-R#1394

[jalvesaq]

Nvim-R relies on the existence of many files created by R. Some of them might be big and it would slow down R usage if Nvim-R had to wait for them to be transferred by a TCP connection. Please, look at ~/.cache/Nvim-R and /dev/shm/Nvim-R-yourlogin. If you can't find these directories, type :echo $NVIMR_TMPDIR and :echo $NVIMR_COMPLDIR to know where they are.

Please, see https://github.com/jalvesaq/Nvim-R/wiki/Remote-access

[jalvesaq]

I added support for R into vimcmdline. If accessing the remote machine through ssh this configuration for init.lua might be enough:

vim.g.cmdline_app = {
    r = 'ssh -t someone@somewhere.local R --no-save',
}

[Tal500]

I added support for R into vimcmdline. If accessing the remote machine through ssh this configuration for init.lua (not tested) might be enough:

vim.g.cmdline_app = {
    r = 'ssh someone@somewhere.local R',
}

Thanks!
Will hopefully test it and report when I could

[jalvesaq]

I have just tried the instructions that were on https://github.com/jalvesaq/Nvim-R/wiki/Remote-access and they no longer work. Nvim-R has become more complex since 2017, and many files created by nvimcom from the remote machine are now made by an R instance called by the nclientserver running locally.

I will delete the code that was an attempt to enable remote access of R. You have to use vimcmdline or another plugin to send code to R running remotely.

[Tal500]

Can you make the following hard-coded R command more configurable?
https://github.com/jalvesaq/Nvim-R/blob/97601b006d8c572fd9c3cf33e2e8d20b6e5f81e8/R/nvimcom/src/apps/nclientserver.c#L1037-L1046

And this line worry me a little bit:

Of course, none of NvimR's features that depend on information on R's workspace will be available.

Is there no other way to get (n)VIM<->remote-R great interoperability?

[jalvesaq]

Nvim-R has many redundant features.

• You will not get syntax highlighting and completion of functions as their libraries are loaded, but you will get the same for all libraries that have either library() or require() calls in the script. as long as you have R and the libraries installed in your local machine.
• You will not have the Object Browser to inspect objects, and completion from cmp-nvim-r will not complete objects from the R workspace, but you still can easily send commands such as ls(), summary(obj), str(obj), and print(obj) to R Console.

[jalvesaq]

Can you make the following hard-coded R command more configurable?

This is a code that runs in the background. It should work without any need for user configuration. Ideally, users should only choose an option meaning "I want to access R remotely", and all necessary internal changes should be automatic. In general, users should choose options that represent what they want and we would have to program Nvim-R to do what is required to make the option work.

[jalvesaq]

I made another attempt at running R remotely: https://github.com/jalvesaq/Nvim-R/tree/remote
If you want to try it, the instructions are at: https://github.com/jalvesaq/Nvim-R/blob/remote/doc/remote_acess.md

You may have to manually install nvimcom on the remote machine. Anyway, nvimcom messages sent from the remote machine still are not reaching the nclientserver in the local machine.

Debugging code is enabled in the remote branch and messages are logged in two files: /dev/shm/nclientserver_log and /dev/shm/nclientserver_stdout.

[jalvesaq]

The remote branch is working on Linux, but I had to replace the UDP server with a TCP one and I can't write the Windows version because I don't have access to a Windows system.

[Tal500]

I made another attempt at running R remotely: https://github.com/jalvesaq/Nvim-R/tree/remote If you want to try it, the instructions are at: https://github.com/jalvesaq/Nvim-R/blob/remote/doc/remote_acess.md

You may have to manually install nvimcom on the remote machine. Anyway, nvimcom messages sent from the remote machine still are not reaching the nclientserver in the local machine.

Debugging code is enabled in the remote branch and messages are logged in two files: /dev/shm/nclientserver_log and /dev/shm/nclientserver_stdout.

Will try this out probably next week! (In a linux environment)
About our work environment: We specifically don't need sshfs here because our home directories are globally shared on NFS.

[jalvesaq]

I could compile the code with mingw now, but I can't run it to know if it actually works.

[jalvesaq]

We specifically don't need sshfs here because our home directories are globally shared on NFS.

I wrote instructions for ssh and sshfs because I know how to use them. The hope is that the instructions will make it easier for people to configure their own environment.