Error : .onLoad failed in loadNamespace() for 'tcltk', details:call: fun(libname, pkgname)

Question

Recently I have trouble librarying the package "adehabitat". I don't know what should I do to cope with the problem. Can anyone knows and offer me help? Thanks a lot.

> sessionInfo()
R version 3.2.2 (2015-08-14)
Platform: x86_64-apple-darwin13.4.0 (64-bit)
Running under: OS X 10.10.2 (Yosemite)
locale:
[1] en_US.UTF-8/en_US.UTF-8/en_US.UTF-8/C/en_US.UTF-8/en_US.UTF-8
attached base packages:
[1] stats     graphics  grDevices utils     datasets  methods   base     
other attached packages:
[1] ade4_1.7-2 sp_1.1-1  
loaded via a namespace (and not attached):
[1] tools_3.2.2     grid_3.2.2      lattice_0.20-33

> install.packages("adehabitat")
Installing package into ‘/Users/penghe/Library/R/3.2/library’
(as ‘lib’ is unspecified)
  There is a binary version available but the source version is later:
           binary source needs_compilation
adehabitat 1.8.17 1.8.18              TRUE
Do you want to install from sources the package which needs compilation?
y/n: n
trying URL 'https://mirrors.ustc.edu.cn/CRAN/bin/macosx/mavericks/contrib/3.2/adehabitat_1.8.17.tgz'
Content type 'application/octet-stream' length 2671207 bytes (2.5 MB)
==================================================
downloaded 2.5 MB
The downloaded binary packages are in
    /var/folders/qr/21mfb0t91rz475z2v8fs0c4w0000gn/T//Rtmphy4lRT/downloaded_packages

> library(adehabitat)
Loading required package: tkrplot
Loading required package: tcltk
Error : .onLoad failed in loadNamespace() for 'tcltk', details:
  call: fun(libname, pkgname)
  error: X11 library is missing: install XQuartz from xquartz.macosforge.org
Error: package ‘tcltk’ could not be loaded

Answer 1

The critical part of the error message is error: X11 library is missing

This happened to me on an R package check on a GitHub Action, which was fixed by adding this to the workflow:

      - name: Install XQuartz on macOS
        if: runner.os == 'macOS'
        run: brew install xquartz --cask

On regular macOS, you may simply be able to run this to install the missing xquartz:

brew install xquartz --cask

Answer 2

In general, the first thing to do when you get an error like this is to read everything that it says thoroughly. In many cases, like this one, you will learn something that either completely solves your problem or gets you close to it.

Take a look at this line, near the end:

  error: X11 library is missing: install XQuartz from xquartz.macosforge.org

Hence, you should probably install XQuartz from that website !