Problem with the matrix() function.
There are other functions where R handles a vector argument differently. The first value may be silently used, used with a warning, or trigger an error.
x <- 1:3 x:9
[1] 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Warning message: In x:9 : numerical expression has 3 elements: only the first used
seq(x, 9)
Error in seq.default(x, 9) : 'from' must be of length 1
rep(1, x)
Error in rep(1, x) : invalid 'times' argument ---------------------------------------- David L Carlson Department of Anthropology Texas A&M University College Station, TX 77843-4352 -----Original Message----- From: R-help <r-help-bounces at r-project.org> On Behalf Of Bert Gunter Sent: Wednesday, November 7, 2018 2:49 PM To: Rolf Turner <r.turner at auckland.ac.nz> Cc: R-help <r-help at r-project.org> Subject: Re: [R] Problem with the matrix() function. I have no opinion on your queries, but whatever is done, it should be properly documented, which appears not to be the case presently afaics. -- Bert
On Wed, Nov 7, 2018 at 12:33 PM Rolf Turner <r.turner at auckland.ac.nz> wrote:
In the course of writing a bit of somewhat convoluted code I recently made a silly error that revealed the following phenomenon: m <- matrix(1:10,nrow=2,ncol=c(5,4)) produces
[,1] [,2] [,3] [,4] [,5] [1,] 1 3 5 7 9 [2,] 2 4 6 8 10
That is, the nonsense value of c(5,4) for the "ncol" argument is accepted, without comment --- the first entry of the given ncol argument is used. It might be argued that this is a reasonable accommodation of the user's ineptitude. I am of the opinion that an error should be thrown if the value of ncol is not an integer scalar. I have also discerned that if ncol is not an integer, it is replaced by its floor value. Is this a Good Thing? What do others think? cheers, Rolf Turner -- Technical Editor ANZJS Department of Statistics University of Auckland Phone: +64-9-373-7599 ext. 88276
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______________________________________________ R-help at r-project.org mailing list -- To UNSUBSCRIBE and more, see 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.