Environment variables are not available in R sessions

[cmdoret]

When starting a new session in an R project on Renkulab, environment variables added through the session creation UI are not available in Rstudio.
This works in python projects.

How to reproduce:

1. New project with R minimal template
2. New session
3. Add env variable, e.g. TEST
4. Start session
5. In Rstudio's terminal printenv | grep TEST
6. No output

Expected outcome:

• env variable exists

Environment:
Tested with the default R-minimal template:

• Image: renku/renkulab-r:4.2.0-0.13.1
• Renku version: 1.9.1
• Template; r-minimal 0.3.5

[olevski]

Confirmed that these work in jupyterlab but not in rstudio.

It is because rstudio requires environment variables to be defined in a specific way.

This means that the notebook service would have to make additional adjustments for the variables to propagate to rstudio.

[olevski]

See here on all the options on how to specify environment variables for Rstudio: https://rviews.rstudio.com/2017/04/19/r-for-enterprise-understanding-r-s-startup/