[R] Why do tabs disappear when pasted into the R console?

[David Winsemius]

On Jun 3, 2013, at 12:46 PM, Tal Galili wrote:

> Very interesting, thank you.
> However, after disabling the tab completion, the RGUI still can't
> distinguish pasted tabs.  e.g:
> 
> # Running:
> 
> Sys.setenv(R_COMPLETION=FALSE)
> Sys.getenv("R_COMPLETION")
> 
> a = read.table( text=
> "
> 1 2
> 3 4
> ")
> a
> 
> # will result in: (instead of two columns)
>  V1
> 1 12
> 2 34

I get the same result pasting fromExcel into RGUI in WinXP with tab-completion disabled. 

But I hope it is not forgotten that….

 …… six hours ago Gabor Grothendieck suggested:

read.delim("clipboard")

I do agree that is is strange but I find that the using (R 2.15.1/WinXP in VMware Fusion virtual box) R GUI editor  will not pass the tabs it recognizes (as signified by the appearance of a 7 character wide gap and the cursor jumping back)  along with source()-ed text when used with the Edit/Run selection menu choice:

read.delim("1	2
3	4")

> read.table(text="12
+ 34
+ "read.delim("12
Error: unexpected symbol in:
"34
"read.delim"
> 34")
+ 
+ 
However with this in the GUI Editor:

test <- read.table(text="1	2
3	4")

Running this succeeds:

> source(file(description="clipboard"))
> test
  V1 V2
1  1  2
2  3  4

So in Windows whatever connection the GUI is using when text from the clipboard is pasted, it somehow removes the tabs it encounters, unlike the connection used by 'source()' when accessing the clipboard file.



-- 
David.

> 
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> 
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> 
> On Mon, Jun 3, 2013 at 5:11 PM, Prof Brian Ripley <ripley at stats.ox.ac.uk>wrote:
> 
>> On 03/06/2013 14:48, peter dalgaard wrote:
>> 
>>> 
>>> On Jun 3, 2013, at 15:22 , Sarah Goslee wrote:
>>> 
>>> Pasting tabs into the console works for me on linux, which suggests
>>>> that you need to provide more information about your OS and all the
>>>> other usual things.
>>>> 
>>> 
>>> Which console and which Linux?
>>> 
>>> Anyways, the thing that usually gets in the way is tab-completion. If you
>>> expect pasting to work exactly as if the same characters were typed at the
>>> keyboard, you can't really expect that TAB will not try to autocomplete
>>> commands and filenames. I don't know whether there's a way to temporarily
>>> disable completion.
>>> 
>> 
>> There are lots of consoles and completion mechanisms.  But on RGui (at
>> least this seems to be Windows), this is controlled by the environment
>> variable R_COMPLETION and that can be set during a session.  Its help says
>> 
>>     ‘R_COMPLETION’: Optional.  If set to ‘FALSE’, command-line
>>          completion is not used.  (Not used by Mac OS GUI.)
>> 
>> and ??completion gets you there.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> -pf
>>> 
>>> 
>>>> Sarah
>>>> 
>>>> On Mon, Jun 3, 2013 at 9:15 AM, Tal Galili <tal.galili at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> 
>>>>> Hello Dear R-help Members,
>>>>> 
>>>>> I have noticed that when pasting text with "tab" in it to the R console
>>>>> it
>>>>> eliminates the tab. Whereas, when pasted into the R Editor, the tab is
>>>>> preserved.
>>>>> For example, pasting this:
>>>>> "1997 7680"
>>>>> In the R Console will result in:
>>>>> "19977680"
>>>>> 
>>>>> Is there a way to preserve the tab?
>>>>> This would allow (for example) to use read.table with a table copied
>>>>> from
>>>>> website/libre-office/excel such as:
>>>>> 
>>>>> a = read.table( text=
>>>>> "
>>>>> 1 2
>>>>> 3 4
>>>>> ")
>>>>> a
>>>>> 
>>>>> I understand I can use readClipboard directly, but I wonder if there is
>>>>> a
>>>>> way to use it while the text is kept in the R Editor.
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> With regards,
>>>>> Tal
>>>>> 
>>>> 

David Winsemius
Alameda, CA, USA