[R] [FORGED] Re: readxl issue

[Jeff Newmiller]

My assessment was and is likely correct.

My error was in writing the wrong function name... should have been read_excel whose parameters need to be adjusted to not look for a header line.

On February 5, 2020 3:48:36 PM PST, Rolf Turner <r.turner using auckland.ac.nz> wrote:
>
>On 6/02/20 11:01 am, Thomas Subia wrote:
>
>> Jeff,
>> 
>> You wrote: " Pay attention to whether the read_csv call is configured
>to expect first line as header."
>> 
>> Here is the code I'm using to extract one cell from a series of Excel
>files having the same physical format.
>> 
>> library(plyr)
>> library(readxl)
>> files <- list.files(pattern="*.xls", full.names = TRUE)
>> # Extract part average from cell c6 for all Excel files
>> avgs <- lapply(files, read_excel, sheet="Flow Data", range=("c9"))
>> # Write data to text file
>> write.table(avgs ,"avgs.txt",sep="\t")
>> 
>> I'm not sure where read_csv applies here.
>
>Jeff probably did not read your email as carefully as he might have,
>and 
>made the unwarranted assumption that you'd be doing something sensible 
>like using *.csv data files rather than mucking about with the 
>notoriously perilous arcana of Excel.
>
>I *don't* muck about with Excel myself, unless absolutely forced to, so
>
>I can't make any specific suggestions, but I *can* make a general 
>suggestion.  When things go wrong, break the procedure down into simple
>
>atomic steps.
>
>* initially deal with just *one* of your *.xls files
>* read it in:  xxx <- read_excel(<whatever>)
>* *don't* write it out to a text file yet, *look* at the <expletive 
>deleted> thing in R first; print it (just type "xxx" or "head(xxx)" if 
>it's large)
>* perhaps convert it to a data frame (it will be a "tibble" and tibbles
>
>confuse the issue): yyy <- as.data.frame(xxx)
>* investigate whether supplying some more arguments to read_excel() 
>solves your problem
>* perhaps try read.xlsx from the xlsx package and see if any insights 
>are revealed.
>* if you're still stumped, make available to the list one of the 
>problematic *.xls files (note that you *cannot* attach such a file to 
>your email; it will get stripped; you'll need to provide a URL from 
>which the file can be obtained).  Given such a file someone on the list
>
>may be able to help you.
>
>cheers,
>
>Rolf Turner

-- 
Sent from my phone. Please excuse my brevity.