R devtools install error - installation of package 'curl' had non-zero exit status

Question

All,

Banging my head up against a wall on this one. I'm trying to install devtools for R on Mac OSX 10.11.2 . Using R version 3.2.3 , installed via homebrew brew install R . However, I get an error when the dependencies are installed for curl. Here's the output when I try to install.packages('curl')

> install.packages('curl')
Installing package into ‘/usr/local/lib/R/3.2/site-library’
(as ‘lib’ is unspecified)
trying URL 'https://rweb.crmda.ku.edu/cran/src/contrib/curl_0.9.5.tar.gz'
Content type 'application/x-gzip' length 261496 bytes (255 KB)
==================================================
downloaded 255 KB

* installing *source* package ‘curl’ ...
** package ‘curl’ successfully unpacked and MD5 sums checked
Using PKG_CFLAGS=
Using PKG_LIBS=-lcurl
** libs
clang -I/usr/local/Cellar/r/3.2.3/R.framework/Resources/include -DNDEBUG -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/opt/gettext/include -I/usr/local/opt/readline/include -I/usr/local/opt/openssl/include -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/include   -fPIC  -g -O2  -c callbacks.c -o callbacks.o
clang -I/usr/local/Cellar/r/3.2.3/R.framework/Resources/include -DNDEBUG -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/opt/gettext/include -I/usr/local/opt/readline/include -I/usr/local/opt/openssl/include -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/include   -fPIC  -g -O2  -c curl.c -o curl.o
clang -I/usr/local/Cellar/r/3.2.3/R.framework/Resources/include -DNDEBUG -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/opt/gettext/include -I/usr/local/opt/readline/include -I/usr/local/opt/openssl/include -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/include   -fPIC  -g -O2  -c download.c -o download.o
clang -I/usr/local/Cellar/r/3.2.3/R.framework/Resources/include -DNDEBUG -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/opt/gettext/include -I/usr/local/opt/readline/include -I/usr/local/opt/openssl/include -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/include   -fPIC  -g -O2  -c escape.c -o escape.o
clang -I/usr/local/Cellar/r/3.2.3/R.framework/Resources/include -DNDEBUG -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/opt/gettext/include -I/usr/local/opt/readline/include -I/usr/local/opt/openssl/include -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/include   -fPIC  -g -O2  -c fetch.c -o fetch.o
clang -I/usr/local/Cellar/r/3.2.3/R.framework/Resources/include -DNDEBUG -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/opt/gettext/include -I/usr/local/opt/readline/include -I/usr/local/opt/openssl/include -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/include   -fPIC  -g -O2  -c form.c -o form.o
clang -I/usr/local/Cellar/r/3.2.3/R.framework/Resources/include -DNDEBUG -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/opt/gettext/include -I/usr/local/opt/readline/include -I/usr/local/opt/openssl/include -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/include   -fPIC  -g -O2  -c getdate.c -o getdate.o
clang -I/usr/local/Cellar/r/3.2.3/R.framework/Resources/include -DNDEBUG -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/opt/gettext/include -I/usr/local/opt/readline/include -I/usr/local/opt/openssl/include -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/include   -fPIC  -g -O2  -c handle.c -o handle.o
clang -I/usr/local/Cellar/r/3.2.3/R.framework/Resources/include -DNDEBUG -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/opt/gettext/include -I/usr/local/opt/readline/include -I/usr/local/opt/openssl/include -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/include   -fPIC  -g -O2  -c ieproxy.c -o ieproxy.o
clang -I/usr/local/Cellar/r/3.2.3/R.framework/Resources/include -DNDEBUG -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/opt/gettext/include -I/usr/local/opt/readline/include -I/usr/local/opt/openssl/include -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/include   -fPIC  -g -O2  -c init.c -o init.o
clang -I/usr/local/Cellar/r/3.2.3/R.framework/Resources/include -DNDEBUG -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/opt/gettext/include -I/usr/local/opt/readline/include -I/usr/local/opt/openssl/include -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/include   -fPIC  -g -O2  -c nslookup.c -o nslookup.o
clang -I/usr/local/Cellar/r/3.2.3/R.framework/Resources/include -DNDEBUG -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/opt/gettext/include -I/usr/local/opt/readline/include -I/usr/local/opt/openssl/include -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/include   -fPIC  -g -O2  -c utils.c -o utils.o
clang -I/usr/local/Cellar/r/3.2.3/R.framework/Resources/include -DNDEBUG -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/opt/gettext/include -I/usr/local/opt/readline/include -I/usr/local/opt/openssl/include -I/usr/local/include  -I/usr/local/include   -fPIC  -g -O2  -c version.c -o version.o
clang -dynamiclib -Wl,-headerpad_max_install_names -undefined dynamic_lookup -single_module -multiply_defined suppress -L/usr/local/Cellar/r/3.2.3/R.framework/Resources/lib -L/usr/local/opt/gettext/lib -L/usr/local/opt/readline/lib -L/usr/local/opt/openssl/lib -L/usr/local/lib -o curl.so callbacks.o curl.o download.o escape.o fetch.o form.o getdate.o handle.o ieproxy.o init.o nslookup.o utils.o version.o -L/usr/local/Cellar/gettext/0.19.7/lib -F/usr/local/Cellar/r/3.2.3/R.framework/.. -framework R -lintl -Wl,-framework -Wl,CoreFoundation
installing to /usr/local/lib/R/3.2/site-library/curl/libs
** R
** data
*** moving datasets to lazyload DB
** inst
** preparing package for lazy loading
** help
*** installing help indices
** building package indices
** installing vignettes
** testing if installed package can be loaded
Error in dyn.load(file, DLLpath = DLLpath, ...) : 
  unable to load shared object '/usr/local/lib/R/3.2/site-library/curl/libs/curl.so':
  dlopen(/usr/local/lib/R/3.2/site-library/curl/libs/curl.so, 6): Symbol not found: _curl_easy_cleanup
  Referenced from: /usr/local/lib/R/3.2/site-library/curl/libs/curl.so
  Expected in: flat namespace
 in /usr/local/lib/R/3.2/site-library/curl/libs/curl.so
Error: loading failed
Execution halted
ERROR: loading failed
* removing ‘/usr/local/lib/R/3.2/site-library/curl’

The downloaded source packages are in
    ‘/private/var/folders/8r/_zl3t3w53tj1mnb6bmyb_55c0000gn/T/RtmpUtKNeA/downloaded_packages’
Warning message:
In install.packages("curl") :
  installation of package ‘curl’ had non-zero exit status

When I type curl --version from the terminal, I get curl 7.43.0 (x86_64-apple-darwin15.0) libcurl/7.43.0 SecureTransport zlib/1.2.5

I've tried reinstalling xcode, reinstall R, and generally reading every non-zero exit status google post I can find. Any help would be appreciated.

Updates

Found a copy of the previous release curl_0.9.4.tar.gz and tried to install with same error. Packages such as forecast, lubridate, Hmisc, etc have all installed successfully.

In response to info request:

> sessionInfo()
R version 3.2.3 (2015-12-10)
Platform: x86_64-apple-darwin15.2.0 (64-bit)
Running under: OS X 10.11.2 (El Capitan)

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     
> .libPaths()
[1] "/usr/local/lib/R/3.2/site-library"                                   
[2] "/usr/local/Cellar/r/3.2.3/R.framework/Versions/3.2/Resources/library"

Answer 1

I think I figured it out. I had an old - most likely badly customized - Makevars file that was lying around in my .R folder. It seems that it was essentially overriding all the build options of the package. Once I removed it, all went back to normal and I managed to update curl and devtools. I hope this helps.