Getting R set up on Linux can be somewhat frustrating. Many of the fundamental packages (like {devtools} or {remotes}) have implicit system dependencies. Installing these packages can involve numerous iterations back and forth between R and the shell while you figure out what those dependencies are and get them all installed.
I’ve been through this process many times now and finally just created a quick script that will get most of it done quickly and easily.
sudo apt update
sudo apt install -y \
libcurl4-openssl-dev \
libssl-dev \
libxml2-dev \
libfontconfig1-dev \
libharfbuzz-dev \
libfribidi-dev \
libfreetype6-dev \
libpng-dev \
libtiff5-dev \
libjpeg-dev \
libpq-dev
After that you should be able to install the majority of R packages without having to worry about system dependencies.