[R] Output from file.info()$mtime

[Fisher Dennis]

Professor Ripley

You asked “how that managed to give TRUE? (I apologize for the mangled quotes — the error occurred with plain quotes).
All that I can say is that R versions <= 3.1.0 allowed my code to execute without error.  The bug report appears to address the issue.  I typically review Dalgaard’s list of changes in each new version  —  it does not contain anything about this bug fix.

Dennis


Dennis Fisher MD
P < (The "P Less Than" Company)
Phone: 1-866-PLessThan (1-866-753-7784)
Fax: 1-866-PLessThan (1-866-753-7784)
www.PLessThan.com



On Aug 8, 2014, at 1:54 AM, Prof Brian Ripley <ripley at stats.ox.ac.uk> wrote:

> On 07/08/2014 23:37, Fisher Dennis wrote:
>> R 3.1.1
>> OS X (and Windows)
>> 
>> Colleagues
>> 
>> I have some code that manages files.  Previously (as late as 3.1.0), the command:
>> 	file.info(FILENAME)$mtime == “”
>> yielded T/F
>> 
>> Now, it triggers an error:
>> 	Error in as.POSIXlt.character(x, tz, ...) :
>> 	  character string is not in a standard unambiguous format
>> 
>> I looked through Peter Dalgaard’s list of changes in 3.1.1 and I cannot find anything that would explain the change between versions.  I have fixed the problem.  However, I am concerned that other problems may be lurking (i.e., the changes might affect other commands).
>> 
>> Of note, I ran:
>> 	str(file.info(FILENAME)$mtime)
>> in both versions of R and the results did not differ
>> 
>> Can anyone explain what changed so that I can search my code efficiently?
> 
> Can you explain how that managed to give TRUE (sic)?  It was always a POSIXct timestamp, and as such is never equal "" (assuming that your mail client mangled ASCII double quotes).
> 
> I believe the relevant report is https://bugs.r-project.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=15829
> 
> 
> 
>> 
>> Thanks in advance.
>> 
>> Dennis
>> 
>> 
>> Dennis Fisher MD
>> P < (The "P Less Than" Company)
>> Phone: 1-866-PLessThan (1-866-753-7784)
>> Fax: 1-866-PLessThan (1-866-753-7784)
>> www.PLessThan.com
>