Running R tikzDevice with tinytex: Help troubleshooting `! LaTeX Error: File `tikz.sty' not found`

Question

I am trying to generate a tikz plot using R/ggplot2 via the tikzDevice package. I've had to wade through many errors as I figured out how to install R and tinytex on my docker image, but I've run into the following error which has simply stumped me.

When I run the code that generates my plot, this is the error I get:

Error in getMetricsFromLatex(TeXMetrics, verbose = verbose) : 
TeX was unable to calculate metrics for:

        \char77

Run the following commands for diagnosis:

        tikzTest()
        tikzTest("\\char77")

Common reasons for failure include:
  * The string contains a character which is special to LaTeX unless
    escaped properly, such as % or $.
  * The string makes use of LaTeX commands provided by a package and
    the tikzDevice was not told to load the package.

The TeX and log files used for the calculation can help diagnose the
problem. If these files are missing, rerun the plot and make sure to
keep the R session open.
TeX file: tikzStringWidthCalc.tex
Log file: tikzStringWidthCalc.log
Calls: <Anonymous> ... descentDetails.text -> grid.Call -> <Anonymous> -> getMetricsFromLatex
Execution halted

And the output of tikzDevice::tikzTest() is as follows:

Active compiler:
        /home/jovyan/.TinyTeX/bin/x86_64-linux/pdflatex
        pdfTeX 3.141592653-2.6-1.40.23 (TeX Live 2021)
        kpathsea version 6.3.3

Measuring dimensions of: A
Running command: '/home/jovyan/.TinyTeX/bin/x86_64-linux/pdflatex' -interaction=batchmode -halt-on-error -output-directory '/tmp/RtmpLhckyy/tikzDevice29a5e00452e' 'tikzStringWidthCalc.tex'
This is pdfTeX, Version 3.141592653-2.6-1.40.23 (TeX Live 2021) (preloaded format=pdflatex)
 restricted \write18 enabled.
entering extended mode

TeX was unable to calculate metrics for:

        A

Contents of TeX file tikzStringWidthCalc.tex:

\documentclass[10pt]{article}

\usepackage{tikz}

\usepackage[active,tightpage,psfixbb]{preview}

\PreviewEnvironment{pgfpicture}

\setlength\PreviewBorder{0pt}

\usepackage{tikz}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}

\usetikzlibrary{calc}

\batchmode
\begin{document}
\begin{tikzpicture}
\node[inner sep=0pt, outer sep=0pt, scale=1] (TeX) {A};
\path let \p1 = ($(TeX.east) - (TeX.west)$),
    \n1 = {veclen(\x1,\y1)} in (TeX.east) -- (TeX.west)
    node{ \typeout{tikzTeXWidth=\n1} };
\end{tikzpicture}
\end{document}
Contents of log file tikzStringWidthCalc.log:

This is pdfTeX, Version 3.141592653-2.6-1.40.23 (TeX Live 2021) (preloaded format=pdflatex 2022.3.16)  16 MAR 2022 23:30
entering extended mode
 restricted \write18 enabled.
 %&-line parsing enabled.
**tikzStringWidthCalc.tex
(/tmp/RtmpLhckyy/tikzDevice29a5e00452e/tikzStringWidthCalc.tex
LaTeX2e <2021-11-15> patch level 1
L3 programming layer <2022-02-24> (/home/jovyan/.TinyTeX/texmf-dist/tex/latex/base/article.cls
Document Class: article 2021/10/04 v1.4n Standard LaTeX document class
(/home/jovyan/.TinyTeX/texmf-dist/tex/latex/base/size10.clo
File: size10.clo 2021/10/04 v1.4n Standard LaTeX file (size option)
)
\c@part=\count185
\c@section=\count186
\c@subsection=\count187
\c@subsubsection=\count188
\c@paragraph=\count189
\c@subparagraph=\count190
\c@figure=\count191
\c@table=\count192
\abovecaptionskip=\skip47
\belowcaptionskip=\skip48
\bibindent=\dimen138
)

! LaTeX Error: File `tikz.sty' not found.

Type X to quit or <RETURN> to proceed,
or enter new name. (Default extension: sty)

Enter file name: 
! Emergency stop.
<read *> 
         
l.4 ^^M
        
Here is how much of TeX's memory you used:
 235 strings out of 480236
 3181 string characters out of 5895451
 287032 words of memory out of 5000000
 18278 multiletter control sequences out of 15000+600000
 469259 words of font info for 28 fonts, out of 8000000 for 9000
 14 hyphenation exceptions out of 8191
 34i,0n,38p,138b,36s stack positions out of 5000i,500n,10000p,200000b,80000s

!  ==> Fatal error occurred, no output PDF file produced!

As you can see I am using tinytex, but I have installed the recommended packages for this setup as described in the tinytex documentation (i.e., I've already ran tlmgr install pgf preview xcolor).

I've read every post I could possibly find on this subject but am coming up empty. Any tips to help me troubleshoot this problem would be greatly appreciated.

Answer 1

it would help if you had a minimum reproducible example to check on our end.
This said, the message LaTeX Error: File `tikz.sty' not found. suggests that a possible solution would be for you to throw:

library(tinytex)
tlmgr_search('/tikz.sty')    # search for tikz.sty
tlmgr_install('pgf')         # install the psnfss package
tlmgr_update()               # update everything

since tlmgr_search('/tikz.sty') gives you

tlmgr search --file --global "/tikz.sty"
tlmgr.pl: package repository https://ctan.mirror.garr.it/mirrors/ctan/systems/texlive/tlnet 
pgf:
    texmf-dist/tex/latex/pgf/frontendlayer/tikz.sty

but then you already installed pgf... that's where tikz.sty lives.