For Linux/UNIX/macOS you need 'libmagic' installed which is a component of the 'file' utility: . You can find out more information on 'libmagic' and 'file' at this URL: . Here are the incantations you must use to get magic for your environment: - `apt-get install libmagic-dev` on Ubuntu/Debian-ish systems - `brew install libmagic` on macOS - `yum install file-devel` on RHEL/CentOS/Fedora For Windows you will need Rtools version 3.3 or higher (it may work with older ones, but it's only been tested on Rtools version 3.3 & 3.4).