Ensure Chrome is available, downloading if necessary

Checks if Chrome is available and optionally downloads a standalone Chrome for Testing if not found. This ensures Chrome-based rendering works without requiring a system-wide Chrome installation.

Usage

ensure_chrome(download = FALSE, verbose = TRUE)

Arguments

download: If TRUE and Chrome is not found, attempt to download Chrome for Testing (default FALSE).
verbose: Print status messages (default TRUE).

Value

TRUE if Chrome is available (or was successfully downloaded), FALSE otherwise.

Details

When download = TRUE, this function will download "Chrome for Testing", a standalone Chrome distribution designed for automation. The download is approximately 150MB and is cached in the user's data directory.

Alternatively, you can:

Install Chrome/Chromium system-wide
Set the CHROMOTE_CHROME environment variable to point to an existing installation

Examples

# Check and report status
ensure_chrome()
#> ✔ Chrome is available: /Applications/Google Chrome.app/Contents/MacOS/Google Chrome
#> [1] TRUE

# Download Chrome if not available
if (FALSE)  # Requires an external Chrome/Chromium installation 
ensure_chrome(download = TRUE)
 # \dontrun{}