reading from text file that have different rowlength and create a data frame

x <- read.table(textConnection(";this is example

closeAllConnections()

x

Hi R-experts

I have many text files to read and combined them into one into R that are
output from other programs. My textfile have unbalanced number of rows for
example:

;this is example
; r help
Var1 ? ? Var2 ? ? ?Var3 ? ? ?Var4 ? ? ?Var5
0 ? ? ? ? ? ? 0.05 ? ? 0.01 ? ? ? ?12
1 ? ? ? ? ? ? 0.04 ? ? 0.06 ? ? ? ?18 ? ? ? ?A
2 ? ? ? ? ? ? 0.05 ? ? 0.08 ? ? ? ?14
3 ? ? ? ? ? ? 0.01 ? ? 0.06 ? ? ? ?15 ? ? ? B
4 ? ? ? ? ? ? 0.05 ? ? 0.07 ? ? ? ?14 ? ? ? C

and so on
Inames<-as.data.frame(read.table("CLG1mpd.asc",header=T,comment=";"))
Inames<-as.matrix(read.table("example.txt",header=T,comment=";"))
Error in scan(file, what, nmax, sep, dec, quote, skip, nlines, na.strings,
:
?line 1 did not have 5 elements


In bestcase scenerio, I want to fill the blank space with NA's, with matrix
or dataframe
?Var1 ? ? Var2 ? ? ?Var3 ? ? ?Var4 ? ? ?Var5
0 ? ? ? ? ? ? 0.05 ? ? 0.01 ? ? ? ?12 ? ? ? ?NA
1 ? ? ? ? ? ? 0.04 ? ? 0.06 ? ? ? ?18 ? ? ? ?A
2 ? ? ? ? ? ? 0.05 ? ? 0.08 ? ? ? ?14 ? ? ? NA
3 ? ? ? ? ? ? 0.01 ? ? 0.06 ? ? ? ?15 ? ? ? B
4 ? ? ? ? ? ? 0.05 ? ? 0.07 ? ? ? ?14 ? ? ? C

The minimum would be to ?remove the column Var5, so that my data.frame would
look like the follows:
?Var1 ? ? Var2 ? ? ?Var3 ? ? ?Var4
0 ? ? ? ? ? ? 0.05 ? ? 0.01 ? ? ? ?12
1 ? ? ? ? ? ? 0.04 ? ? 0.06 ? ? ? ?18
2 ? ? ? ? ? ? 0.05 ? ? 0.08 ? ? ? ?14
3 ? ? ? ? ? ? 0.01 ? ? 0.06 ? ? ? ?15
4 ? ? ? ? ? ? 0.05 ? ? 0.07 ? ? ? ?14
--
Thank you in advance for the help.

Ram H

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