This is close, but it does quote the header names, but does produce
the same dataframe when read back in:
> RAW.API <-
> structure("id,event_arm,name,dob,pushed_text,pushed_calc,complete\n\"01\",\"event_1_arm_1\",\"John\",\"1979-05-01\",\"\",\"\",2\n\"01\",\"event_2_arm_1\",\"John\",\"2012-09-02\",\"abc\",\"123\",1\n\"01\",\"event_3_arm_1\",\"John\",\"2012-09-10\",\"\",\"\",2\n\"02\",\"event_1_arm_1\",\"Mary\",\"1951-09-10\",\"def\",\"456\",2\n\"02\",\"event_2_arm_1\",\"Mary\",\"1978-09-12\",\"\",\"\",2\n",
> "`Content-Type`" = structure(c("text/html", "utf-8"), .Names = c("",
> "charset")))
> x <- read.csv(textConnection(RAW.API), as.is = TRUE)
> x
id event_arm name dob pushed_text pushed_calc complete
1 1 event_1_arm_1 John 1979-05-01 NA 2
2 1 event_2_arm_1 John 2012-09-02 abc 123 1
3 1 event_3_arm_1 John 2012-09-10 NA 2
4 2 event_1_arm_1 Mary 1951-09-10 def 456 2
5 2 event_2_arm_1 Mary 1978-09-12 NA 2
>
> # now put it back into the same string; write.csv does quote alphanumerics
> write.csv(x, textConnection('output', 'w'), row.names = FALSE)
> x.out <- paste(output, collapse = '\n')
> # read it back in to show it is the same
> x.in <- read.csv(textConnection(x.out), as.is = TRUE)
> x.in
id event_arm name dob pushed_text pushed_calc complete
1 1 event_1_arm_1 John 1979-05-01 NA 2
2 1 event_2_arm_1 John 2012-09-02 abc 123 1
3 1 event_3_arm_1 John 2012-09-10 NA 2
4 2 event_1_arm_1 Mary 1951-09-10 def 456 2
5 2 event_2_arm_1 Mary 1978-09-12 NA 2
>
On Wed, Sep 12, 2012 at 8:21 PM, Eric Fail <eric.f...@gmx.us> wrote:
> Dear R experts,
>
> I'm reading data from an online database via API and it gets delivered in
> this messy comma separated structure,
>
>> RAW.API <-
>> structure("id,event_arm,name,dob,pushed_text,pushed_calc,complete\n\"01\",\"event_1_arm_1\",\"John\",\"1979-05-01\",\"\",\"\",2\n\"01\",\"event_2_arm_1\",\"John\",\"2012-09-02\",\"abc\",\"123\",1\n\"01\",\"event_3_arm_1\",\"John\",\"2012-09-10\",\"\",\"\",2\n\"02\",\"event_1_arm_1\",\"Mary\",\"1951-09-10\",\"def\",\"456\",2\n\"02\",\"event_2_arm_1\",\"Mary\",\"1978-09-12\",\"\",\"\",2\n",
>> "`Content-Type`" = structure(c("text/html", "utf-8"), .Names = c("",
>> "charset")))
>
> I have this script that nicely parses it into a data frame,
>
>> (df <- read.table(file = textConnection(RAW.API), header = TRUE,
> sep = ",", na.strings = "", stringsAsFactors = FALSE))
>> id event_arm name dob pushed_text pushed_calc complete
>> 1 1 event_1_arm_1 John 1979-05-01 <NA> NA 2
>> 2 1 event_2_arm_1 John 2012-09-02 abc 123 1
>> 3 1 event_3_arm_1 John 2012-09-10 <NA> NA 2
>> 4 2 event_1_arm_1 Mary 1951-09-10 def 456 2
>> 5 2 event_2_arm_1 Mary 1978-09-12 <NA> NA 2
>
> I then do some calculations and write them to pushed_text and pushed_calc
> whereafter I need to format the data back to the messy comma separated
> structure it came in.
>
> I imagine something like this,
>
>> API.back <- `some magic command`(df, ...)
>
>> identical(RAW.API, API.back)
>> [1] TRUE
>
> Some command that can format my data from the data frame I made, df, back to
> the structure that the raw API-object came in, RAW.API.
>
> Any help would be appreciated.
>
> Thanks for reading.
>
> Eric
>
> ______________________________________________
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> 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.
--
Jim Holtman
Data Munger Guru
What is the problem that you are trying to solve?
Tell me what you want to do, not how you want to do it.
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