CODEWITHSUNDEEP
regexrgsub
Spencer
Spencer

Reputation: 131

Using gsub in R to remove values in Zip Code field

I have a data frame that contains columns of values, one of which is United States Postal Zip codes. 

    Row_num Restaurant Address             City     State Zip 
    26698   m          1460 Memorial Drive Chicopee MA    01020-3964

For this entry, I want to only have the 5 digit zip code 01020 and remove the "-3964" after it and do this for every entry in my data frame. Right now the zip code column is being treated as a chr by r.

I have tried the following gsub code:

df$Zip <- gsub(df$Zip, pattern="-[0,9]{0,4}", replacement = "")

However, all that does is replace the "-" with no space. Not only is that not what I want but it is also not what I expected so any help as to how gsub behaves and how to get the desired result would be appreciated.

Thank you!

Edit: I have found out through trial and error that this block of code works as well 

df$Zip <- gsub(df$Zip, pattern="-.*", replacement = "")

Upvotes: 0

Views: 1146

Answers (1)

IRTFM
IRTFM

Reputation: 263331

The character class you defined has only three elements 0, 9, and ",". Inside character class brackets you need to use dash as the range operator, so try:

df$Zip <- gsub(df$Zip, pattern="-[0-9]{0,4}", replacement = "")

Upvotes: 1

Related Questions