After reading a bit more about reticulate I think I now understand that it only brings in the Python content of the library.
Sorry to be blunt, but in my opinion this is not really very useful. The ENTIRE point of conda is that it manages environments comprised of software from all realms simultaneously. So use_condaenv bring in Python from the environment, but not R packages.
So, I'm still trying to figure out how to robustly use a conda environment with RStudio.
This is my best attempt:
conda_base = system("which conda | sed 's/bin\\/conda//'")
env = "myenv"
env_base = paste0(conda_base,"envs/",myenv,"/")
PATH = Sys.getenv('PATH')
message(paste0("PATH: ",PATH))
Sys.setenv("R_LIBS_SITE"=paste0(env_base, "/lib/R/library/"))
#Sys.setenv("R_LIBS_USER"=paste0(env_base, "/lib/"))
Sys.setenv("R_LIBS_USER"="/home/balter/R/")
Sys.setenv("R_INCLUDE_DIR"= paste0(env_base, "/lib/R/include/"))
Sys.setenv("R_SHARE_DIR"=paste0(env_base, "/lib/R/share"))
Sys.setenv("R_HOME"=paste0(env_base, "/lib/R"))
Sys.setenv(PATH=paste0(env_base, "/bin:", PATH))
.libPaths(paste0(env_base, "/lib/R/library/"))
#Sys.setenv(LD_LIBRARY_PATH=paste0(env_base, "/lib/R/library/"))
I'm especially unsure about the LD_LIBRARY_PATH.