How to upgrade the R components that get installed with Microsoft R Services (In-Database)

• doodlingdba

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  January 10, 2018 at 8:17 am

  #334468

  Hi all
  So I have recently installed SQ: 2016 Microsoft R Services (In-Database) on a development server for our catastrophe modelling devs. I have run the following script which tells me we are running version 3.2.2 of the R components:

  declare @v-2 varchar(100);
  exec sp_execute_external_script @language=N'R'
  , @script = N'v <- toString(getRversion())'
  , @params = N'@v varchar(100) output'
  , @v-2 = @v-2 out;
  print @v-2;

  My devs are now asking if we can upgrade the version to 3.3.2 as they have packages that require this later version. It hasn't been simple figuring out whether this is possible or not. From my research it seems that this would be possible using SqlBindr.exe but only in SQL 2017.

  https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sql/advanced-analytics/r/use-sqlbindr-exe-to-upgrade-an-instance-of-sql-server

  OR, you have to install Microsoft R Standalone - which somehow doesn't feel right (especially as there can be complications have both installed on the same server):

  https://dba.stackexchange.com/questions/162129/upgrade-sql-server-2016-r-service-in-database

  Any help/clarification would be really appreciated!

  Thanks
  Doodles

• Paulo de Jesus

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  January 10, 2018 at 8:40 am

  #1975298

  Have a look at step 7 of the article: http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/R+Services/157272/
  You'll have to upgrade each library from the R command line.
  The trick is to check exactly which folder contains the libraries being used.

• doodlingdba

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  January 10, 2018 at 9:24 am

  #1975318

  Thanks for your quick response! In my post i asked whether you have to install Microsoft R Standalone - which in your article it says you do. But Microsoft do no recommend having these installed on the same server - see here:

  https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sql/advanced-analytics/r/set-up-sql-server-r-services-in-database

  Excerpt as follows:
  "SQL Server setup also includes the option to install a "standalone" version of the machine learning components that does not require the database engine, and does not run in SQL Server. We generally recommend that you install this option on a different computer than the computer that hosts SQL Server"

  So it seems strange that we now need to install R standalone just to get the R components that get installed with SQL R In-Database upgraded. 

  Can anyone else shed more light on this?

  Thanks
  .