How can I access Windows COM objects in R v3?

Question

Some time ago, you used to be able to install the rcom package in R to use COM scripting (eg, access to external programs.) Unfortunately, it seems to be discontinued:

Answer 1

This really should be a comment, but I don't have enough rep points yet to leave one. I found that the above steps did not work for me, but the answer posted by Lisa Ann on this question, RExcel in R 3.0.x, did solve my problem installing rcom. Since you need rcom to run RExcel, the initial steps to install RExcel cover installing rcom on newer versions of R (such as 3.0.2).

Specifically, following the advice on statconn's wiki, http://homepage.univie.ac.at/erich.neuwirth/php/rcomwiki/doku.php?id=wiki:how_to_install

You also need to follow these instructions if you upgrade R, i.e. you install a new >release of R after you have installed RExcel.

Download the statconn DCOM server and execute the program you downloaded Start R as administrator (on Windows 7 you need to right-click the R icon and click the >corresponding item) In R, run the following commands (you must start R as administrator to do this)

install.packages(c("rscproxy","rcom"),repos="http://rcom.univie.ac.at/download",lib=.Library)

library(rcom)

comRegisterRegistry()

Now you have rcom installed, [instructions for installing RExcel follow...]