Error in get(moduleCall, envir = sim@.envir[[cur[["moduleName"]]]]) : invalid 'envir' argument

[Eliot McIntire]

Question from @SteveCumming

This strange error came while trying to run a SpaDES object returned by an apparently OK call to simInit. Any thoughts?

This code works on my machine, but not my students, suggesting a config problem.

>> Simulation dependencies: use `depends(sim)` to view dependencies for each module   >> Simulation times:      current start end timeunit [1,] 0       0     30  "year"    >> Modules:      Name     Timeunit [1,] "ageMap" "year"    >> Objects Loaded:   objectName loadTime loaded file fun package arguments intervals 1     mapDim        0   TRUE <NA>  NA      NA        NA        NA   >> Objects stored: ageMap : Formal class 'RasterLayer' [package "raster"] with 12 slots ageMapAge : function (sim)  ageMapInit : function (sim)  doEvent.ageMap : function (sim, eventTime, eventType, debug = FALSE)  mapDim :  num 40   >> Parameters:       Module        Parameter Value .checkpoint             file       .checkpoint         interval    NA       ageMap .plotInitialTime     0       ageMap    .plotInterval     1       ageMap .saveInitialTime    NA       ageMap    .saveInterval    NA       ageMap   returnInterval     1       ageMap        startTime     0   >> Completed Events: Null data.table (0 rows and 0 cols) NULL   >> Current Event: Null data.table (0 rows and 0 cols) NULL   >> Scheduled Events:    eventTime moduleName eventType eventPriority 1:         0 checkpoint      init             5 2:         0       save      init             5 3:         0   progress      init             5 4:         0       load      init             5 5:         0     ageMap      init             5   > tmp=spades(mySim) Error in get(moduleCall, envir = sim@.envir[[cur[["moduleName"]]]]) :   invalid 'envir' argument

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[Eliot McIntire]

This happens when the user creates an object in the simList that is the same name as the module. And it may not be occurring in the module itself. 

example:

Say there is a module called FireModule

mySim <- simInit(...., modules = list("FireModule"))

This will put all the functions from that module inside sim$FireModule

Then if some module does this:

sim$FireModule <- TRUE

then you will get the above error. 

The development version of SpaDES.core will shortly have a meaningful error indicating this is the problem. The user will have to fix this themselves by *never* making an object with the same name as a module.

[Eliot McIntire]

This has now been superceded, by locking the sim$<moduleName> binding. In other words, it won't work if a module tries to assign something that that name.

This has been added in github commit: https://github.com/PredictiveEcology/SpaDES.core/commit/858a68015abff8d82e4c0c0306f13869b49fd76c