Getting R to print English error messages
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If you live in a non-English locale such as I do, you’ll likely receive error messages in your locale language when things go wrong in R.
1 + "r" ## Error in 1 + "r": nicht-numerisches Argument für binären Operator
This is a problem because it highly limits the results when searching for error messages on Google. Have you ever read a stackoverflow post that was not in English? I haven’t.
So, how can you tell R to not translate error messages? By telling R that you are in an English locale.
Sys.setenv(lang = "en_US")
Your next error will be printed in English.
1 + "r" ## Error in 1 + "r": non-numeric argument to binary operator
Great!
The only problem with this approach is that the next time you start a new R session this change will be reverted. To make this change persistent add Sys.setenv(lang = "en_US") to your .Rprofile file.
Never heard of .Rprofile? It’s basically an R script that – if present – gets executed whenever you start R. That makes it perfect for the purpose of changing your locale.
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