Quit¶
When you run an R job, you should properly quit the job when you’re done, by typing “q()” at the R prompt, and responding to the query about “Save workspace image?” appropriately. DO NOT log off without terminating your R job/session, and you should not kill a window with a running R process unless you follow one of the suggestions below.
Batch¶
If you want your R job to keep running after you log out, the best way to run R is through the BATCH command, i.e. run a command like this one at the UNIX prompt:
R CMD BATCH cmds.r output.txt &where “cmds.r” is a file containing the R commands that you wish to run,
and output.txt is the file where R will write its output. Type
help(BATCH) from inside of R for more information. You can use this
technique even if you don’t think you’ll be logging off before your job
is done to make sure that R will terminate properly.
Explicit Invocation¶
If you don’t want to worry about shutting down your interactive R
session, you MUST use either the -save or the -no-save option. The
reason that this is important is that if you log off or close a window
while an interactive job is running, R will fall into an infinite loop
at the end of your program, trying to ask you whether or not to save the
data space. Using one of the options mentioned above will prevent this
problem, as R will know the disposition of your data space before the
program is completed. In other words, instead of just typing R at the
UNIX prompt, type
R --saveor
R --no-save