?read.csv does actually have
row.names: a vector of row names. This can be a vector giving the
actual row names, or a single number giving the column of the
table which contains the row names, or character string
giving the name of the table column containing the row
> From: Simon Urbanek
> By default there is no column name for a column of row names.
> spreadsheets. Note that such CSV files can be read in R by
>
>read.csv(file = "", row.names = 1)
AHA!! Many thanks.
I see this clue is in ?write.table, though; I was looking for help on
Just for completeness, all this is well documented:
CSV files:
By default there is no column name for a column of row names. If
‘col.names = NA’ and ‘row.names = TRUE’ a blank column name is
added, which is the convention used for CSV files to be read by
spreadsheets. Note
Dear Gabriel,
On 2021-07-01 6:29 p.m., Gabriel Becker wrote:
On Thu, Jul 1, 2021 at 1:46 PM Stephen Ellison
wrote:
Please run the reproducible example provided.
When you do, you will see that write.csv writes an unnecessary empty
header field ("") over the row names column. This makes the nu
On Thu, Jul 1, 2021 at 1:46 PM Stephen Ellison
wrote:
>
> Please run the reproducible example provided.
> When you do, you will see that write.csv writes an unnecessary empty
> header field ("") over the row names column. This makes the number of
> header fields equal to the number of columns _in
> the "unhelpful" column are the row names. They are considered an
> important part of a data frame and therefore the default (row.names =
> TRUE) is to not lose them (as there is no way back once you do). If you don't
> want to preserve the row names you can simply set row.names=FALSE.
Please run
Stephen,
I am sure one can find a lot of small issues and inconsistencies with R and
it’s standard library. It has to support a lot of legacy cruft and the design
process — especially in the early days — focused on getting things done rather
than delivering a standard library of immaculate qua
Stephen,
the "unhelpful" column are the row names. They are considered an important part
of a data frame and therefore the default (row.names = TRUE) is to not lose
them (as there is no way back once you do). If you don't want to preserve the
row names you can simply set row.names=FALSE.
Che
Hi Stephen,
Personally, I don't have super strong feelings about this, but
https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc4180#section-2 does say that the
optional header line should have the same number of fields as the data
records, so in as much as that is the "CSV specification", R's read.csv
behavi
