[R] read.table - reading text variables as text

[Ista Zahn]

Hi Nick,

On Wed, Feb 16, 2011 at 7:28 AM, Nick Riches <nick.riches at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi
>
> I've resolved the following query by adding the option "stringsAsFactors =
> FALSE"

Sure, that works, but it doesn't explain why as.is="stim" didn't work.
Unfortunately I cannot reproduce:

> dat <- data.frame(stim=letters[10], x=1:10)
> write.table(dat, file="test.dat", sep=",")
> tmp1 <- read.table(file="test.dat", header=T, sep=",")
> tmp2 <- read.table(file="test.dat", header=T, sep=",", as.is="stim")
> str(tmp1)
'data.frame':	10 obs. of  2 variables:
 $ stim: Factor w/ 1 level "j": 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1
 $ x   : int  1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
> str(tmp2)
'data.frame':	10 obs. of  2 variables:
 $ stim: chr  "j" "j" "j" "j" ...
 $ x   : int  1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
>

> sessionInfo()
R version 2.11.1 (2010-05-31)
i386-pc-mingw32

locale:
[1] LC_COLLATE=English_United States.1252
[2] LC_CTYPE=English_United States.1252
[3] LC_MONETARY=English_United States.1252
[4] LC_NUMERIC=C
[5] LC_TIME=English_United States.1252

attached base packages:
[1] grid      stats     graphics  grDevices utils     datasets  methods
[8] base

other attached packages:
[1] ggplot2_0.8.9 proto_0.3-8   reshape_0.8.3 plyr_1.2.1

loaded via a namespace (and not attached):
[1] digest_0.4.2 tools_2.11.1

Best,
Ista

>
> Thanks
>
> Nick Riches
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: Nick Riches <nick.riches at gmail.com>
> Date: 16 February 2011 12:16
> Subject: read.table - reading text variables as text
> To: r-help at r-project.org
>
>
> Hi
>
> I'm reading a CSV file using read.table, and it keeps importing a text
> variable as a factor. To overcome this, I've used the as.is command
> referring to the variable in question (called "stim")
>
> data<-read.table(file.choose(), header=T, sep=",", as.is = "stim")
>
> However, "stim" is still imported as a factor. I notice there are other
> read.table options related to this issue, but the help files don't appear to
> contain much detail on these.
>
> Any help would be greatly appreciated.
>
> Best wishes
>
> Nick Riches
>
> --
> Lecturer in Speech and Language Pathology
> Room 1.9
> King George VI Building
> Queen Victoria Road
> University of Newcastle-upon Tyne
> NE1 7RU
>
> 0191 222 8720
>
>
>
> --
> Lecturer in Speech and Language Pathology
> Room 1.9
> King George VI Building
> Queen Victoria Road
> University of Newcastle-upon Tyne
> NE1 7RU
>
> 0191 222 8720
>
>        [[alternative HTML version deleted]]
>
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>



-- 
Ista Zahn
Graduate student
University of Rochester
Department of Clinical and Social Psychology
http://yourpsyche.org