[Rd] Problem with {

[Peter Dalgaard]

Gabor Grothendieck wrote:
> Why does the error get generated here?  Is it a bug?  It seems that
> f and "{" are the same but when used in sapply f works but { does not.
> Is its use in lapply really "an incorrect context"?
>
>   
>> f <- function(x, y) y
>> f(1, 2)
>>     
> [1] 2
>   
>> "{"(1, 2)
>>     
> [1] 2
>   
>> lapply("y", function(x, y) y, 1:4) # ok
>>     
> [[1]]
> [1] 1 2 3 4
>   
>> lapply("y", "{", 1:4) # error
>>     
> Error in lapply("y", "{", 1:4) : '...' used in an incorrect context
>   
lapply() is not really  part of the problem:

> (function(x,...) "{"(x,...))(1,2)
Error in (function(x, ...) { : '...' used in an incorrect context

Not sure exactly why this is so, but "{" has somewhat nonstandard
evaluation semantics and you cannot do
"{x, ...}" either, nor for that matter  x <- function(...)...; x(2),
which gives off a similar error.


>> R.version.string # XP
>>     
> [1] "R version 2.5.1 (2007-06-27)"
>
> See:
>
> https://www.stat.math.ethz.ch/pipermail/r-help/2007-July/135999.html
>
> for a variation of the lapply using sapply (which also has the same
> problem if one uses { instead of f).
>
> ______________________________________________
> R-devel at r-project.org mailing list
> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel
>   


-- 
   O__  ---- Peter Dalgaard             Øster Farimagsgade 5, Entr.B
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