[R] readLines errors

[David Winsemius]

On Dec 24, 2011, at 4:12 AM, rusers.sh wrote:

> Hi All,
>  I met a problem using readLines function to return the data from  
> Google
> maps.
>
>  readLines(url("
> http://ditu.google.cn/maps/geo?q=+qianshuichong,+guichi+anhui,+CN&output=csv&key=ABQIAAAAq8Fnd_oUka-7RdS6BrD7GBTqeABoQuNTXS36G_rkiwQnKRW6GBTkns8JpKz6y6dScgB8827dlddUlg 
> "),
> n=1, warn=FALSE)
>
> [1] "200,4,30.6528380,117.4872250"
>
>  The above code is ok because the address is English, but it cannot  
> work
> when i change the address into zh-hans (Chinese simplified). See  
> below.
>
>  readLines(url("http://ditu.google.cn/maps/geo?q=+Ç°Ë®³å<http://ditu.google.cn/maps/geo?q=+%E5%89%8D%E6%B0%B4%E5 
> %86%B2>
> ,+¹ó³Ø+°²»Õ, 
> + 
> ÖÐ 
> ¹ 
> ú 
> &output 
> = 
> csv 
> &key 
> = 
> ABQIAAAAq8Fnd_oUka 
> -7RdS6BrD7GBTqeABoQuNTXS36G_rkiwQnKRW6GBTkns8JpKz6y6dScgB8827dlddUlg 
> &language=zh-CN&region=zh_Hans"),
> n=1, warn=FALSE)

When I plug that URL into my browser (Firefox) I get this text on a  
white background:

602,0,0,0
When I execute that code in R I get:
[1] "{"
And when I remove the lines restriction I get:
[1] "{"
[2] "  \"name\": \" Ç°Ë®³å\\u003chttp://ditu.google.cn/maps/geo? 
q= 前水冲\\u003e\","
[3] "  \"Status\": {"
[4] "    \"code\": 602,"
[5] "    \"request\": \"geocode\""
[6] "  }"
[7] "}"
I don't read Chinese , however it does appear that there was some sort  
of extra processing step that Firefox carried out to arrive at the  
displayed text.

>
> [1] "400,0,0,0"
>
>  The returned value is wrong. I also tried several other options, but
> still have the same problem. The interesting thing is if i paste the  
> URL
> into the IE explorer directly, it do return the correct values.
>
>  Anybody can give me some suggestions or hints to solve this?
>
>  Thanks a lot.
>
> P.S. See below for the other possibilities i tried.
>
> readLines(url("http://ditu.google.cn/maps/geo?q=+Ç°Ë®³å<http://ditu.google.cn/maps/geo?q=+%E5%89%8D%E6%B0%B4%E5 
> %86%B2>
> ,+¹ó³Ø+°²»Õ, 
> + 
> ÖÐ 
> ¹ 
> ú 
> &output 
> = 
> csv 
> &key 
> = 
> ABQIAAAAq8Fnd_oUka 
> -7RdS6BrD7GBTqeABoQuNTXS36G_rkiwQnKRW6GBTkns8JpKz6y6dScgB8827dlddUlg 
> &language=zh-CN&region=zh"),
> n=1, warn=FALSE)
>
> [1] "400,0,0,0"
>
> readLines(url("http://ditu.google.cn/maps/geo?q=+Ç°Ë®³å<http://ditu.google.cn/maps/geo?q=+%E5%89%8D%E6%B0%B4%E5 
> %86%B2>
> ,+¹ó³Ø+°²»Õ, 
> + 
> ÖÐ 
> ¹ 
> ú 
> &output 
> = 
> csv 
> &key 
> = 
> ABQIAAAAq8Fnd_oUka 
> -7RdS6BrD7GBTqeABoQuNTXS36G_rkiwQnKRW6GBTkns8JpKz6y6dScgB8827dlddUlg 
> &language=zh-CN"),
> n=1, warn=FALSE)
>
> [1] "400,0,0,0"
>
> readLines(url("http://ditu.google.cn/maps/geo?q=+Ç°Ë®³å<http://ditu.google.cn/maps/geo?q=+%E5%89%8D%E6%B0%B4%E5 
> %86%B2>
> ,+¹ó³Ø+°²»Õ, 
> + 
> ÖÐ 
> ¹ 
> ú 
> &output 
> = 
> csv 
> &key 
> = 
> ABQIAAAAq8Fnd_oUka 
> -7RdS6BrD7GBTqeABoQuNTXS36G_rkiwQnKRW6GBTkns8JpKz6y6dScgB8827dlddUlg 
> &language=zh-CN"),
> n=1, warn=FALSE,encoding="UTF-8")
>
> [1] "400,0,0,0"
>
>
> -- 
> -----------------
> Jane Chang
> Queen's
>
> 	[[alternative HTML version deleted]]
>
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> and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.

David Winsemius, MD
West Hartford, CT