Datatable manipulation

Hi,
Try:

dat1 <- read.table(text="a ??? b ??? c ??? d?????? e
1 ??? 2 ??? 3 ??? 4 ??? 5
10 ??? 9 ??? 8 ??? 7 ??? 6",sep="",header=TRUE)

Names1<- read.table(text="Original? ??? New??? 
e ??? ee
b ??? bb??? 
a ??? aa
c ??? cc
d ??? dd",sep="",header=TRUE,stringsAsFactors=FALSE)

It is better to dput() your dataset.? For example:
?dput(Names1)
structure(list(Original = c("e", "b", "a", "c", "d"), New = c("ee", 
"bb", "aa", "cc", "dd")), .Names = c("Original", "New"), class = "data.frame", row.names = c(NA, 
-5L))


?names(dat1) <- Names1[,2][match(names(dat1), Names1[,1])] ##
?dat1
#? aa bb cc dd ee
#1? 1? 2? 3? 4? 5
#2 10? 9? 8? 7? 6
A.K.

Hi,

Thanks. I used as.character() and got the right strings.

Btw, I have lots of handicaps regarding R.

I have to rename the columns(I have 22 columns here). I have the new names along with the original names in another dataset. Right now, I am going hardcoding all the? 19 name changes(tedious and not optimum). 1st 3 names remain the same. I will give u a sample dataset. Let me know if there is any easy way of doing this.? Pardon the displaced column labels.



Original dataset. 



?? a b c d??????????? ? 
e 
1 2 3 4 5 
10 9 8 7 6 





Dataset for name change 


Original? New 



e ee 



b bb 



a aa 



c cc 



d dd 








I want my final dataset to be like this: 

aa bb cc dd ee 
1 2 3 4 5 
10 9 8 7 6 



?Could u tell me an optimal way to do it. My method is tedious and not good. 

Also, is there a way to import .xls without perl (windows)?


Thanks for being patient. :)