Difference between 10 and 10L

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class(10)
[1] "numeric"
  > class(10L)
  [1] "integer"
  > class(10i)
  [1] "complex"

Why not 10I for integer?  Perhaps because "I" and "l"
look too similar, perhaps because "i" and "I" sound
too similar.  The "L" does not mean "long": integers
are 4 bytes long.

Bill Dunlap
Spotfire, TIBCO Software
wdunlap tibco.com
-----Original Message-----
From: r-help-bounces at r-project.org [mailto:r-help-bounces at r-project.org] On Behalf
Of brwin338
Sent: Thursday, May 03, 2012 4:33 PM
To: r-help at r-project.org
Subject: [R] Difference between 10 and 10L

Good Evening
We have been searching through the R documentation manuals without success on this
one.
What is the purpose or result of the "L" in the following?

n=10
and
n=10L

or
c(5,10)
versus
c(5L,10L)

Thanks
Joe

Thanks
Joe

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______________________________________________
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PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html
and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
   >  class(10)
   [1] "numeric"
   >  class(10L)
   [1] "integer"
   >  class(10i)
   [1] "complex"

Why not 10I for integer?  Perhaps because "I" and "l"
look too similar, perhaps because "i" and "I" sound
too similar.  The "L" does not mean "long": integers
are 4 bytes long.
Actually it does: this notation dates from the C language on 16-bit 
computers where integers were 16-bits and longs were 32-bit (and R has 
no 'long' type).

The author of this in R never explained why he chose the notation, but 
it is shorter than as.integer(10), and more efficient as the coercion is 
done at parse time.

(C has a different convention: 10 is integer, 10. is double.  Changing 
to that would have altered existing code, since e.g. 4294967296 is not a 
valid integer.)
Bill Dunlap
Spotfire, TIBCO Software
wdunlap tibco.com

-----Original Message-----
From: r-help-bounces at r-project.org [mailto:r-help-bounces at r-project.org] On Behalf
Of brwin338
Sent: Thursday, May 03, 2012 4:33 PM
To: r-help at r-project.org
Subject: [R] Difference between 10 and 10L

Good Evening
We have been searching through the R documentation manuals without success on this
one.
What is the purpose or result of the "L" in the following?

n=10
and
n=10L

or
c(5,10)
versus
c(5L,10L)

Thanks
Joe

Thanks
Joe

	[[alternative HTML version deleted]]

______________________________________________
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.

Brian D. Ripley,                  ripley at stats.ox.ac.uk
Professor of Applied Statistics,  http://www.stats.ox.ac.uk/~ripley/
University of Oxford,             Tel:  +44 1865 272861 (self)
1 South Parks Road,                     +44 1865 272866 (PA)
Oxford OX1 3TG, UK                Fax:  +44 1865 272595
Good Evening
We have been searching through the R documentation manuals without success on this one.
What is the purpose or result of the "L" in the following?

n=10
and 
n=10L

or
c(5,10)
versus
c(5L,10L)
Hi.

The help page ?"1L" or, equivalently, ?NumericConstants says

     An numeric constant immediately followed by ?L? is regarded as an
     ?integer? number when possible (and with a warning if it contains
     a ?"."?).

Try typeof(1) and typeof(1L).

Petr Savicky.