SPSS Statistics

Hi @Robert Tett

The PROCESS macro is not a custom dialog or extension created or supported by IBM SPSS Statistics Support.   So your first move should be to ensure that you have a version of it that has been tested with IBM SPSS Statistics 30.0.0.0. (and now 31.0.0.0).  I suspect Dr. Andrew Hayes has not touched this one in quite awhile.

Assuming all is correct  and proper with your media (custom dialog or extension bundle file) and the underlying macro, you'll want to check where your extensions are being written to.

See - https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/spss-statistics/31.0.0?topic=bundles-installation-locations-extensions

Use SHOW EXTPATHS. command syntax to check where you currently have custom dialogs and extensions installed.  The paths that show up will be the ones where you need write privileges in order to install. 

PROCESS does work, or at least install, with SPSS V30 and 29.  I just rechecked with PROCESS5.0.  That location failure message sometimes occurs when there is a component file that the OS thinks is in use when you go to install a new version or when your system is set up with certain security restrictions.  So be sure that you do the install in a fresh instance of SPSS and that you select the spe file for the install.  Starting SPSS in admin mode should help.

If that still doesn't work, and the output of SHOW EXT looks okay, you can create a custom location.  Create a directory where you know you will have write permission and then create an environment variable named SPSS_EXTENSIONS_PATH with value of that location.  That environment variable should be part of your standard system.  Then do the PROCESS install in a fresh SPSS session (so that it sees the environment variable).

Thanks to both! I'll give these a try and let you know how they go.

The resolution on this one turned out to be to verify the permissions on the "~/Library/Application Support/IBM/SPSS Statistics/one" directory.  This is the default location for Extensions, Custom Dialogs, Python3 and R instances.  In this case, the "~/Library/Application support/IBM" existed, but it was owned by root and had permissions set only for root:

drwx------    3 root  staff     96 Jun 13 07:08 IBM

We reset the permissions to Robert and allowed others to read and execute:

drwxr-xr-x    3 robert  staff     96 Jun 13 07:08 IBM

At that point the entire "~/Library/Application Support/IBM/SPSS Statistics/one" directory structure and contents were successfully created and populated, allowing the third party PROCESS v5.0 extension bundle to be installed and used.

Thanks to David and Rhonda for walking me through the fix! I could not have done it without their help. Much appreciated.