[R] Basic question on function "identical"

[(Ted Harding)]

On 13-Dec-03 Martin Maechler wrote:
> In general, use
> 
>   ==       for testing equality of integer numbers (of type "integer"
>            or not)

I hope this is not a suggestion to avoid usage like

  which(x == max(x))

when x is a vector of reals? (i.e. should be OK when you know that
the thing on one side of == should be an exact copy in its internal
representation of the thing on the other side, if equality in the
usual sense holds).

In other words, I hope that (for instance) max(x) does not differ
internally from whichever of x[1] , ... , x[N] has the largest value ...

>   all.equal  for testing (near)equality non-integer numbers, and
>            many other more structured objects.
> 
>   identical  only if you understand more about the S language ;-)

Cheers,
Ted.


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Date: 13-Dec-03                                       Time: 13:31:42
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