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dates in French format

2 messages · Denis Chabot

Original
Denis Chabot
# 
(I've put the R Mac list in cc because of the crashes I have  
experienced trying some of the suggestions below)

Hi Gabor and Prof Ripley,

Le 31 janv. 08 ? 02:11, Prof Brian Ripley a ?crit :
You are right, sorry about that:


 > library(chron)
 > sessionInfo()
R version 2.6.1 (2007-11-26)
i386-apple-darwin8.10.1

locale:
fr_FR.UTF-8/fr_FR.UTF-8/fr_FR.UTF-8/C/fr_FR.UTF-8/fr_FR.UTF-8

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

other attached packages:
[1] chron_2.3-16
I was ready to blame Excel for the use of non-standard abbreviations,  
but I would have been wrong: it seems that "janv" is a Mac OS X  
decision from what I can see in my system settings. I am not sure what  
would be a bullet-proof authority on french abbreviations. My  
dictionary was of no help, but wikipedia seems to endorse Mac OS X and  
Windows use of "janv":

<http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mois#Abr.C3.A9viations>
I tried this too:
 > format(Sys.Date(), "%d-%b-%y")
[1] "31-jan-08"
 > format(Sys.Date()-50, "%d-%b-%y")
[1] "12-d?c-07"

I am lost here: since the OS uses "janv", why did the above give  
"jan"???
Thank you Prof Ripley, although I'll have to do my homework to fully  
understand what is happening with the function you wrote.

But I wonder why I cannot make this a Date object:

 > x <- "9-janv-08"
 > x2 <- strsplit(x, "-")
 > x3 <- sapply(x2, function(x) {x[2] <- tr[x[2]]; paste(x,  
collapse="-")})
 > as.Date(x3, format = "%d-%b-%y")
[1] "2008-01-09"
 > class(x3)
[1] "character"
 > x4 <- as.Date(x3, format = "%d-%b-%y")

  *** caught bus error ***
address 0x8, cause 'non-existent physical address'

Traceback:
  1: strptime(x, format)
  2: as.Date.character(x3, format = "%d-%b-%y")
  3: as.Date(x3, format = "%d-%b-%y")

Possible actions:
1: abort (with core dump, if enabled)
2: normal R exit
3: exit R without saving workspace
4: exit R saving workspace

The problem may be my system as I get this error when trying Gabor's  
suggestions (below).

Le 31 janv. 08 ? 00:21, Gabor Grothendieck a ?crit :
> library(chron)
 > dd <- c("7-d?c-07", "11-d?c-07", "14-d?c-07", "18-d?c-07", "21- 
d?c-07",
+ "24-d?c-07", "26-d?c-07", "28-d?c-07", "31-d?c-07", "2-janv-08",
+ "4-janv-08", "7-janv-08", "9-janv-08", "11-janv-08", "14-janv-08",
+ "16-janv-08", "18-janv-08")
 > Sys.setlocale("LC_ALL", "French")
[1] ""
Warning message:
In Sys.setlocale("LC_ALL", "French") :
   la requ?te OS pour sp?cifier la localisation ? "French" n'a pas pu  
?tre honor?e
 > chron(unclass(as.Date(dd, "%d-%b-%y")))

  *** caught bus error ***
address 0x8, cause 'non-existent physical address'

Traceback:
  1: strptime(x, format)
  2: as.Date.character(dd, "%d-%b-%y")
  3: as.Date(dd, "%d-%b-%y")
  4: inherits(dates., "dates")
  5: chron(unclass(as.Date(dd, "%d-%b-%y")))

Possible actions:
1: abort (with core dump, if enabled)
2: normal R exit
3: exit R without saving workspace
4: exit R saving workspace
Again, this Sys.setlocale call does not work for me and the use of  
as.Date crashes my copy of R:

 > library(chron)
 > library(gsubfn)
Le chargement a n?cessit? le package : proto
 > french.months <- format(seq(as.Date("2000-01-01"), length = 12, by  
= "month"), "%b")

  *** caught bus error ***
address 0x8, cause 'non-existent physical address'

Traceback:
  1: strptime(x, f)
  2: fromchar(x)
  3: as.Date.character("2000-01-01")
  4: as.Date("2000-01-01")
  5: seq(as.Date("2000-01-01"), length = 12, by = "month")
  6: format(seq(as.Date("2000-01-01"), length = 12, by = "month"),      
"%b")

Possible actions:
1: abort (with core dump, if enabled)
2: normal R exit
3: exit R without saving workspace
4: exit R saving workspace

However, if I replace that call by this, the rest of Gabor's solution  
works.

 > library(chron)
 > library(gsubfn)
Le chargement a n?cessit? le package : proto
 > french.months <- c("janv", "f?v", "mars", "avr", "mai", "juin",  
"juil", "ao?t", "sept", "oct", "nov", "d?c")
 > dd <- c("7-d?c-07", "11-d?c-07", "14-d?c-07", "18-d?c-07", "21- 
d?c-07",
+ "24-d?c-07", "26-d?c-07", "28-d?c-07", "31-d?c-07", "2-janv-08",
+ "4-janv-08", "7-janv-08", "9-janv-08", "11-janv-08", "14-janv-08",
+ "16-janv-08", "18-janv-08")
 > f <- function (d, m, y) chron(paste(pmatch(m, french.months), d, y,  
sep = "/"))
 > strapply(dd, "(.*)-(.*)-(.*)", f, backref = -3, simplify = c)
  [1] 12/07/07 12/11/07 12/14/07 12/18/07 12/21/07 12/24/07 12/26/07  
12/28/07
  [9] 12/31/07 01/02/08 01/04/08 01/07/08 01/09/08 01/11/08 01/14/08  
01/16/08
[17] 01/18/08

So thanks again. I will try to reinstall R on my computer and see if I  
still get these errors.


Denis
Denis Chabot
# 
Hi all,

The crashes I reported earlier were cause by R 2.6.1 for Mac not  
liking the OS date setting "french canada", an issue that has been  
solved (by Simon Urbanek). The crashes did not occur when the OS was  
set to use normal french formats for dates. With that setting, the  
suggestions by Prof Ripley and Gabor all worked nicely.

Now that my dates are a chron object, I do have a new problem. The  
formatting of the dates on the x axis leaves to be desired. Instead of  
having day month and year, or at the very least day and month, I only  
get month and year so that many tick labels are identical. I also get  
a warning which puzzles me.

For instance:
 > start <- chron("12/01/2007")
 > other.dates <- seq(1,60,2)
 > Date <- start + other.dates
 > plot(1:length(Date)~Date)

6 ticks appear on the x axis. The first three are labeled "12/07" and  
the other three are labeled "01/08". I also get this:

Warning messages:
1: In v[[perm[1]]] : correspondance partielle de 'm' en 'month'
2: In v[[perm[2]]] : correspondance partielle de 'y' en 'year'

so there is only partial correspondance between "m" and "month" and  
between "y" and "year". Yet "Date" here is a proper chron object, so I  
fail to see why "correspondance" is only partial.

If I do Date2 <- as.Date(Date) and use this as my x axis, the six  
labels are more usable (d?c 03, d?c 13, d?c 23, jan 02, jan 12, jan 22).

I suppose I can plot without x labels and draw my own, but I had not  
expected it would be necessary.

 > sessionInfo()
R version 2.6.1 (2007-11-26)
i386-apple-darwin8.10.1

locale:
fr_FR.UTF-8/fr_FR.UTF-8/fr_FR.UTF-8/C/fr_FR.UTF-8/fr_FR.UTF-8

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

other attached packages:
[1] zoo_1.4-1    chron_2.3-16

loaded via a namespace (and not attached):
[1] grid_2.6.1     lattice_0.17-2 tools_2.6.1


Denis

Le 31 janv. 08 ? 09:46, Denis Chabot a ?crit :