[ARROW-12743] [R] Add additional DESCRIPTION fields for dev dependencies and update docs accordingly

• Type: Improvement
• Status: Resolved
• Priority: Major
• Resolution: Fixed
• Fix Version/s: 8.0.0
• Component/s: R
• Labels: pull-request-available
• External issue URL: https://github.com/apache/arrow/issues/28485
• Assignee: Dragoș Moldovan-Grünfeld
• Reporter: Nicola Crane
• Created: 11/May/21 20:50
• Updated: 11/Jan/23 08:28
• Resolved: 02/Mar/22 15:01

Description

Edit: Blocked by a bug in {remotes} which results in second order dependencies of packages listed in Config/Needs?... not being installed.
====================
Recent updates to the remotes package mean that additional fields can be added to a package's DESCRIPTION and remotes functions can take the field as a parameter and install these additional dependencies: https://github.com/r-lib/remotes/blob/master/NEWS.md#new-functions-and-features

We could update DESCRIPTION to use these fields and update the docs to use this functionality of remotes instead of having separate references to packages to install.

 

Issue Links

• is related to: ARROW-15299 [R] investigate {remotes} dependencies "soft" vs TRUE
• relates to: ARROW-15299 [R] investigate {remotes} dependencies "soft" vs TRUE
• links to: GitHub Pull Request #11921
• links to: remotes issue