
Thank you Brian. When I wrote the email I typed url into the subject line by accident.  I mean path.   Thank you,Tyler

 > Date: Tue, 30 Aug 2011 14:00:22 +0100
> From: ripley@stats.ox.ac.uk
> To: tyler_rinker@hotmail.com
> CC: r-help@r-project.org
> Subject: Re: [R] url prep function (backslash issue)
> 
> You seem to be looking for chartr("\\", "/", path) (and FAQ Q7.8)
> 
> What does any of this have to do with 'url prep': URLs are never 
> written with backslashes?
> 
> On Tue, 30 Aug 2011, Tyler Rinker wrote:
> 
> >
> >
> >
> > Greeting R
> > Community,
> >
> > I am a
> > windows user so this problem may be specific to windows. I often want to source
> > files from within R
> >
> > such as:
> > C:\Users\Rinker\Desktop\Research & Law\Data\School Data 09-10. To source
> > this file I need to go
> >
> > through the
> > path and replace all the backslashes (\) with forward slashes (/). I usually do
> > this in MS Word
> >
> > using the
> > replace option, however, I'd like to do this in R. Attempting to write a
> > function to do this runs into
> >
> > problems:
> >
> > When I
> > enter the following:
> >
> > readyPath
> > <- function(path){
> >
> > z <- gsub("\", "/", path)
> >
> > return(z)
> >
> > }
> >
> > I get:
> >
> >>
> > readyPath <- function(path){
> >
> > + z <- gsub("\", "/", path)
> >
> > + return(z)
> >
> > + }
> >
> > +
> >
> > ...meaning
> > R can't close the sequence (presumably because of the backslash which has
> > special meaning).
> >
> > So I tried
> > (\\):
> >
> >
> >
> > readyPath <- function(path){
> >
> > z <- gsub("\\", "/", path)
> >
> > return(z)
> >
> > }This allows
> > the function to be stored as an object but I'm not sure if this is correct.
> 
> It isn't: please do read the help for gsub (\ is a metacharacter).
> 
> > When I try
> > the function the backslash gets me again:
> >
> >>
> > readyPath("C:\Users\Rinker\Desktop\Research & Law\Data\School Data
> > 09-10")
> >
> > Error: '\U' used without hex digits in character string starting
> > "C:\U"
> 
> You cannot do that: you have to scan a file or escape \
> 
> > This is
> > what I'd like the function to return:
> >
> > [1]
> > "C:/Users/Rinker/Desktop/Research & Law/Data/School Data 09-10"
> >
> > I want a
> > function in which I enter a path and it returns the path with backslashes
> >
> > replaced
> > with forward slashes. Is there a way to make a function to do this?
> 
> ?normalizePath
> chartr("\\", "/", path)
> 
> > Windows 7
> > user
> >
> > R version
> > 2.14 beta
> >
> > Thank you,
> >
> > Tyler
> > Rinker
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > 	[[alternative HTML version deleted]]
> >
> > ______________________________________________
> > R-help@r-project.org mailing list
> > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help
> > PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html
> > and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
> >
> 
> -- 
> Brian D. Ripley,                  ripley@stats.ox.ac.uk
> Professor of Applied Statistics,  http://www.stats.ox.ac.uk/~ripley/
> University of Oxford,             Tel:  +44 1865 272861 (self)
> 1 South Parks Road,                     +44 1865 272866 (PA)
> Oxford OX1 3TG, UK                Fax:  +44 1865 272595
 		 	   		  
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