CODEWITHSUNDEEP
jsonrlistdataframe
Cybernetic
Cybernetic

Reputation: 13334

Adding a list of data frames to one of the variables in a data frame (R)

I am trying to create the data structure shown here (read in from RJSONIO). I need to produce this structure in R from raw data. As you can see it is a data frame of 4 variables, where the 4th variable (children) is a list of data frames. I am having trouble finding a way to create a data frame that contains a list as one of its variables.

Data Structure as read in from RJSONIO (rjsonio_frame)

'data.frame':   5 obs. of  4 variables:
 $ name    : chr  "" "" "" "" ...
 $ imageURL: chr  "images/failure.png" "images/failure.png" "images/failure.png" "images/failure.png" ...
 $ id      : chr  "2" "11" "20" "29" ...
 $ children:List of 5
  ..$ :'data.frame':    8 obs. of  3 variables:
  .. ..$ name    : chr  "word 1" "word 2" "word 3" "word 4" ...
  .. ..$ imageURL: chr  "" "" "" "" ...
  .. ..$ id      : chr  "3" "4" "5" "6" ...
  ..$ :'data.frame':    8 obs. of  3 variables:
  .. ..$ name    : chr  "word 1" "word 2" "word 3" "word 4" ...
  .. ..$ imageURL: chr  "" "" "" "" ...
  .. ..$ id      : chr  "12" "13" "14" "15" ...
  ..$ :'data.frame':    8 obs. of  3 variables:
  .. ..$ name    : chr  "word 1" "word 2" "word 3" "word 4" ...
  .. ..$ imageURL: chr  "" "" "" "" ...
  .. ..$ id      : chr  "21" "22" "23" "24" ...
  ..$ :'data.frame':    8 obs. of  3 variables:
  .. ..$ name    : chr  "word 1" "word 2" "word 3" "word 4" ...
  .. ..$ imageURL: chr  "" "" "" "" ...
  .. ..$ id      : chr  "30" "31" "32" "33" ...
  ..$ :'data.frame':    8 obs. of  3 variables:
  .. ..$ name    : chr  "word 1" "word 2" "word 3" "word 4" ...
  .. ..$ imageURL: chr  "" "" "" "" ...
  .. ..$ id      : chr  "39" "40" "41" "42" ...

I can create a list of data frames easily (the imageURL is blank):

list_of_frames

[[1]] 
        name imageURL id
1       word1           3
2       word2           4
3       word3           5
4       word4           6
5       word5           7

[[2]]
        name imageURL id
1       word1           8
2       word2           9
3       word3          10
4       word4          11
5       word5          12

[[3]]
       name imageURL id
1      word1          13
2      word2          14
3      word3          15
4      word4          16
5      word5          17

But how can I add this list to the character variable of the top most data frame (assume I can already make the rest of the required data frame)? I have tried this:

final_frame <- data.frame(name=name_vector, imageURL=image_vector, id=id_vector, children=list_of_frames)

The name, imageURL, and id all go into the data frame correctly, but the list_of_frames does not. If I will subset the CORRECT version from RSJONIO here (names are blank):

rjsonio_frame[[4]]

  name           imageURL id
1      images/failure.png  2
2      images/failure.png 11
3      images/failure.png 20
4      images/failure.png 29
5      images/failure.png 38
                                                                                                        children
1        word 1, word 2, word 3, word 4, word 5, word 6, word 7, word 8, , , , , , , , , 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10
2 word 1, word 2, word 3, word 4, word 5, word 6, word 7, word 8, , , , , , , , , 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19
3 word 1, word 2, word 3, word 4, word 5, word 6, word 7, word 8, , , , , , , , , 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28

Not the appearance of the children variable. I subset this further I get:

rjsonio_frame[[4]][[4]]

[[1]]
    name imageURL id
1 word 1           3
2 word 2           4
3 word 3           5
4 word 4           6
5 word 5           7
6 word 6           8
7 word 7           9
8 word 8          10

[[2]]
    name imageURL id
1 word 1          12
2 word 2          13
3 word 3          14
4 word 4          15
5 word 5          16
6 word 6          17
7 word 7          18
8 word 8          19

[[3]]
    name imageURL id
1 word 1          21
2 word 2          22
3 word 3          23
4 word 4          24
5 word 5          25
6 word 6          26
7 word 7          27
8 word 8          28

This looks like my list_of_frames. But my final_frame does not show this.

Upvotes: 0

Views: 54

Answers (1)

bergant
bergant

Reputation: 7232

Just put it outside the data.frame initialization, so data.frame() will not unlist the children:

final_frame <- data.frame(
  name=name_vector, 
  imageURL=image_vector, 
  id=id_vector)

final_frame$children <- list_of_frames

EDIT (for sake of completeness):

... or as akrun suggested - you can inhibit conversion by

final_frame <- data.frame(
  name=name_vector, 
  imageURL=image_vector, 
  id=id_vector,
  children = I(list_of_frames))

Upvotes: 1

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