Dunno about runtime. We used to have much more - all the Rdconv stuff used to
be based on pattern matching by Perl scripts, but they were converted to R
scripts and later to use proper parsers.
For building, if you ever need to regenerate a configure script or write your
own for a package, not
Preamble: I am in no way opposed to Perl in general - I love Perl and
probably always will.
R currently has Perl as both a build-time and run-time dependency. This
adds about 200 Mb, give or take, to the required environment size (as
measured in CentOS - looks like it might be a bit smaller in Ub
