[R] Re-sent to correct list: passing parameters

[Shravan Vasishth]

Hi,

My apologies for sending this message earlier to the wrong list (next
time I'll wait till I'm fully awake).

I'm a new R user.  I want to do the following:

I want to pass a filename to R repeatedly (about 400 times) in order to
do a repetitive task (calculating regressions).

The way I'm setting it up is to write a bash script that will create an
R source file on the fly for each file. Here's the script in the
abstract:

#!/bin/sh

for f in *.vec; do

#for each file f with extension .vec,  create an
#R source file that reads in the  file f (as a table or whatever) and
#then  load it as an object (here, "foo"); there will be other  code
#as well, of course, after that.  After that R source file has
#completed its job, remove it  and repeat with the next file

TEMPFILE=temp$$.R
echo "foo <- read.table(\"$f\"); bar <- t(foo); bar;" | cat - template.R
> $TEMPFILE
R --silent --slave < $TEMPFILE >> outfile.test
rm -f  $TEMPFILE done

It works, but this is a really ugly hack, so my question is: is there a
better way to do this? For example, is there some way to pass a
filehandle as a parameter to R? From reading the manuals and old news
posts and responses, it seems the answer is no. I'm thinking of a
command like

R --silent -slave < source.R  $f  >> outfile.test

where $f will be used as the variable for the file to be converted to an

object ("foo" in my toy example above).

I hope my explanation makes sense.

Thanks in advance,

Shravan Vasishth

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