[R] How to replace slashes with back slashes

[Philippe Grosjean]

The second syntax is correct:

 > gsub('/', '\\\\', 'c:/dir1/dir2/file.ext')
[1] "c:\\dir1\\dir2\\file.ext"

Indeed, R escapes backslashes. That is why they are doubled in R 
strings. However, they appear as single backslashes in oyur text file:

 > res <- gsub('/', '\\\\', 'c:/dir1/dir2/file.ext')
 > cat(res, file = "test.txt")
 > file.show("test.txt", delete.file = TRUE)

You got this in your file:

c:\dir1\dir2\file.ext

thus pretty readable by a Windows app.
Best,

Philippe Grosjean

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Joerg Klausen wrote:
> Dear R-helpers
> 
> I am running R2.0.0 under Windows 2000. I am compiling a number of file paths into a simple text file that will be read by some other software we use. Unfortunately, it  can only handle file paths with back slashes (MS Windows convention), and from R, I get file paths with forward slashes. The following didn't work. 
> 
> 
>>gsub('/', '\\', 'c:/dir1/dir2/file.ext')
> 
> [1] "c:dir1dir2file.ext"
> 
>>gsub('/', '\\\\', 'c:/dir1/dir2/file.ext')
> 
> [1] "c:\\dir1\\dir2\\file.ext"
> 
> I have tried to find an answer on R-help, but didn't ;-(
> 
> Thanks for helping me,
> Kind regards,
> Jörg
> 
> Dr. Jörg Klausen                       phone : +41 (0)44 823 41 27
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