[R] Help with read.zoo and transform

[Alex Park]

R 

I get a daily feed of data over the internet that I keep in various .csv
files. 

I have built a function that reads that data into R for me:

getMarketData<-function(market)
{
	library(zoo)
	pathname<- "C:/DATA/"
	files<-c("AN_REV.csv","AX_REV.csv","BN_REV.csv")
	markets<-c("AUS","DAX","GBP")
	df<-read.zoo(paste(pathname,files[match(market,markets)],sep=""),
index.column=1, format="%m/%d/%Y", header=F, sep=",")
	df
}

This works fine and returns the dataset as planned:

              V2    V3    V4    V5   V6   V7
1990-01-02 54.89 54.99 54.61 54.61  125 2576
1990-01-03 54.48 54.62 54.29 54.33 1495 3232
1990-01-04 54.67 55.20 54.59 55.08  932 3145
1990-01-05 54.64 54.87 54.57 54.57  272 2567
1990-01-08 54.87 54.89 54.68 54.79  177 2456
1990-01-09 54.87 54.96 54.80 54.88  106 2403

Also if I type the following:

mode(df[1,1])

>"numeric"

That is, my data is treated as numeric (which is as it should be).

Here is where I get a problem. I'd like to add some more columns on to the
end of the dataset to represent the year, quarter, month, and day.

If I try the following within the function it won't work:

df<-transform(df, "Year"=format(time(df), "%Y"))

Curiously, if I do exactly the same line by line in R (i.e. without
specifying a function) then it works fine. Is there any reason why I cannot
use transform in a function?

I also tried a different approach as shown below i.e within my original
function I added the following lines after I had created df:

df[,8:11]<-0
df[,7]<-format(time(df), format="%Y")
df[,8]<-quarters(time(df))
df[,9]<-months(time(df))
df[,10]<-weekdays(time(df))

This worked fine however it changed all my data from numeric to character:

           Open  High  Low   Close Volume OI   Year Quarter Month   Day

1990-01-02 54.89 54.99 54.61 54.61 125    2576 1990 Q1      January Tuesday

1990-01-03 54.48 54.62 54.29 54.33 1495   3232 1990 Q1      January Wedesday
1990-01-04 54.67 55.2  54.59 55.08 932    3145 1990 Q1      January Thursday

1990-01-05 54.64 54.87 54.57 54.57 272    2567 1990 Q1      January Friday

1990-01-08 54.87 54.89 54.68 54.79 177    2456 1990 Q1      January Monday

1990-01-09 54.87 54.96 54.8  54.88 106    2403 1990 Q1      January Tuesday


mode(df[1,1])

>"character"

Why does my numeric data get changed into character?

Can anybody see a simple way to add the data I require whilst retaining the
"numeric" format?

Regards


Alex Park