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Error: not 'a real'?

5 messages · Brian, jim holtman, Milan Bouchet-Valat

Brian
# 
Hi List,

when supplying a vector of atomic vector classes to read.table, I get:
# column classes
colClasses=c("character", "character","numeric", "numeric", "numeric", 
"numeric", "numeric", "numeric",
                                             "numeric", "numeric", 
"numeric", "numeric")
# Error:
Error in scan(file, what, nmax, sep, dec, quote, skip, nlines, 
na.strings,  (from #2) :
   scan() expected 'a real', got '894.6'

How is '894.6' not 'a real [number]'?

Thanks for the ensuing enlightenment or punishment...

Best,
Brian
jim holtman
# 
how about supplying the context of the error.  Show the lines in the file where the error occurred.  

Sent from my iPad
On Oct 20, 2012, at 7:21, Brian <zenlines at gmail.com> wrote:

            

      
      
      
    

        

      
      
    

  
  


  


      

    

    

      
      

        


  

        

      Brian
    

    

      
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Hi Jim,

        
On 10/20/12 13:36, Jim Holtman wrote:

            

      
      
      
    

        
>
 > Sent from my iPad
 >

        
> On Oct 20, 2012, at 7:21, Brian <zenlines at gmail.com> wrote:

        
>
 >> Hi List,
 >>
 >> when supplying a vector of atomic vector classes to read.table, I get:
 >> # column classes
 >> colClasses=c("character", "character","numeric", "numeric", 
"numeric", "numeric", "numeric", "numeric",
 >> "numeric", "numeric", "numeric", "numeric")
 >> # Error:
 >> Error in scan(file, what, nmax, sep, dec, quote, skip, nlines, 
na.strings, (from #2) :

Line #2: (with 'skip=4', so really line 4, but the first line after the 
'header', as indicated above)

LAE;201001010000;2;894.6;3.9;93.8;5.3;3.1;204

            

      
      
      
    

        
>>
 >> How is '894.6' not 'a real [number]'?
 >>
 >> Thanks for the ensuing enlightenment or punishment...
 >>
 >> Best,
 >> Brian
 >>
 >> ______________________________________________
 >> R-help at 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.

my full command:

   read.csv2(file=file, skip=2, na.strings = "-",
             colClasses=c("character", "character","numeric", "numeric",
               "numeric", "numeric", "numeric", "numeric"))

Also, sorry I forgot this:

R version 2.15.1 (2012-06-22)
Platform: x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu (64-bit)

locale:
[1] C

attached base packages:
[1] stats     graphics  grDevices utils     datasets  base

other attached packages:
[1] MASS_7.3-18

Thanks again.
Brian

  
  


  


      

    

    

      
      

        


  

        

      Milan Bouchet-Valat
    

    

      
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Le samedi 20 octobre 2012 ? 14:25 +0200, Brian a ?crit :

            

      
      
      
    

        

      
      
    

        
Why didn't you tell us that you were using read.csv2() and not
read.table() directly? read.csv() passes dec="," to read.table(), which
explains why numbers with a dot are not detected as reals. Just pass
dec="." to fix the problem


Regards

            

      
      
      
    

        

      
      
    

  
  


  


      

    

    

      
      

        


  

        

      Brian
    

    

      
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Hi Milan,
that's right, forgot about that one!
Sorry to bother.
Brian

        
On 10/20/12 14:37, Milan Bouchet-Valat wrote: