Re: "as.numeric" / "As.numeric" [was "R-beta: bugs and problems"]
Z. Todd Taylor (Todd.Taylor@pnl.gov)
Thu, 04 Jun 1998 07:04:12 -0700
Date: Thu, 04 Jun 1998 07:04:12 -0700
From: Todd.Taylor@pnl.gov (Z. Todd Taylor)
Subject: Re: "as.numeric" / "As.numeric" [was "R-beta: bugs and problems"]
To: r-help@stat.math.ethz.ch
Ross Ihaka <ihaka@stat.auckland.ac.nz> wrote:
> Martin Maechler writes:
[ snip ]
> > I've seen
> > As.numeric <- function(x) { storage.mode(x) <- "numeric"; x }
> > solving the above problem.
> >
> > What do you (R-help readers !) think?
>
> I like the idea, but maybe not the name so much (too much scope for
> confusion). Could I make a plug for something like "mode.numeric" or
> "as.numeric.mode".
>
> A single function of the form
>
> ensure.mode(x, "double")
>
> would be another approach.
Maybe it's a little obscure, but for a decade we've been using
the convention of capitalizing a function name to indicate it
as a local "replacement" for a BADIMO(*) S built-in.
e.g.: Mean - just like 'mean' but na.rm defaults to T (Ditto for
Min, Median, Sum, Any, Cor, Range, etc.)
Diff, Lag - return answers exactly parallel to their inputs
Window - returns a ts exactly the size you asked for without
lopping off the end(s)
Brush - eliminates NAs, takes data frames, doesn't crash
on two-column input
Interp - eliminates duplicate tuples, accepts NAs
Scan, Read.Table - accept "filenames" that represent Unix
pipes. e.g., Scan(file = "grep 'keep' myfile |", ...)
(Doesn't anyone else do this?)
--Todd
(*) Broken As Designed In My Opinion
--
Z. Todd Taylor
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
Todd.Taylor@pnl.gov
Why is it Filipino, not Philippino?
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