[R] Read SPSS v 18 .sav file

[Larry Hotchkiss]

Thanks. This is good to know.  -- Larry

---- Original message ----
>Date: Fri, 18 Jun 2010 11:36:40 -0400
>From: David Winsemius <dwinsemius at comcast.net>  
>Subject: Re: [R] Read SPSS v 18 .sav file  
>To: David Winsemius <dwinsemius at comcast.net>
>Cc: Larry Hotchkiss <larryh at UDel.Edu>, r-help at r-project.org
>
>
>On Jun 18, 2010, at 10:44 AM, David Winsemius wrote:
>
>>
>> On Jun 18, 2010, at 10:26 AM, Larry Hotchkiss wrote:
>>
>>> Hi,
>>>
>>> I repeatedly get an error when trying to read an SPSS v. 18 .sav  
>>> file into R.
>>
>> No, you did not get an error message.
>>>
>>>> require(foreign)
>>> Loading required package: foreign
>>>> femaleSPSS.dat <- read.spss("female-04-02-2010.sav")
>>> Warning message:
>>> In read.spss("female-04-02-2010.sav") :
>>> female-04-02-2010.sav: Unrecognized record type 7, subtype 18  
>>> encountered in system file
>>>>
>>>
>>> However, read.spss works for .sav files created in older versions  
>>> of spss.
>>>
>>> I did just reinstall foreign to be sure I have the latest version.  
>>> Does anyone know of an update that works?
>>
>> What makes you think it didn't work? It was _only_ a warning message  
>> after all. Have you looked at femaleSPSS.dat in your workspace?
>>
>> Had you done a search of the archives you would have found many such  
>> early discussions:
>>
>> RSiteSearch("Unrecognized record type 7, subtype 18 encountered in  
>> system file")
>
>I realized looking at this that my standard operating procedure (these  
>days) was to use RSiteSearch() as a way to get to the webpage, and  
>then when I realize that it no longer actually looks at the archives  
>of r-help to turn off all of the default settings and turn on all of  
>the archive settings. I earlier tried to craft a substitute function  
>that would send the site an r-help-centric request, but found that the  
>search engine would not accept my guess at the correct parameters for  
>the three time periods that I am generally finding useful material  
>within:
>
>R-help 2008-2009
>R-help 2010-
>R-help 2002-2007
>
>I am aware that the sos package might be a more flexible set of tools,  
>but I really like the RSiteSearch format. I've just looked at the code  
>and it appears the functions settings have been updated. This would do  
>the trick:
>RSiteSearch("Unrecognized record type 7, subtype 18 encountered in  
>system file", restrict=c("Rhelp10", "Rhelp08", "Rhelp02"),  
>matchesPerPage = 100)
>
>And now I have the facilities to make my desired function:
>
>rhelpSearch <- function(string,
>                    restrict = c("Rhelp10", "Rhelp08", "Rhelp02",  
>"functions" ),
>                    matchesPerPage = 100, ...)
>           RSiteSearch(string=string,  restrict = restrict,   
>matchesPerPage = matchesPerPage, ...)
>
>#testing:
> > RHSrch("Unrecognized record type 7, subtype 18 encountered in  
>system file")
># Succeeds
>
>Thanks to whomever updated RSiteSearch.
>
>David Winsemius, MD
>West Hartford, CT
>