Again, it started from a Stackoverflow question. I heard of the package Rcpp before and I have learned C++ for a few semesters while I was in college, however, I have never quite use C++ after I graduate and neither did I ever think of connecting it with R. I guess it will be an interesting weekend project to do some research how Rcpp works.

This is an article from JSS (Journal of Statistical Software) which basically talks about the ins-and-outs of Rcpp since it was first initiated at 2004.

First, you have to make sure you are using the right compiler if you are trying to compile any code/package from source. There are a few configurations you can tweak to choose between compiler flavors like clang, gcc..etc.