CODEWITHSUNDEEP
rdplyr
Branden Williams
Branden Williams

Reputation: 93

Simplify Repeatable Code in R by passing text to a function to be used as an argument

I've looked around StackOverflow for an answer here, but I think I may be missing a term. Here's the scenario:

I have a large data set with multiple groups that I want to report on. Let's say that this data set has answers to certain questions as columns, and I want to take specific columns and responses, group the answers, and perform counts. Essentially, I have a dplyr filter expression that would look like this:

z <- results %>% filter(AgeGroup %in% c("16-20", "21-25", "26-30")) %>% 
  group_by(AgeGroup) %>% summarize(ageCount=n())

Then I generate a table with the results using xtable() and dump them in my Rmarkdown document. What I'd like to do is create a function that can do this, such that I can do the following

resultPrint <- function(qualifier, groupColumn) {
  return(results %>% filter(qualifier) %>% 
         group_by(groupColumn) %>% summarize(count=n())
}

resultPrint("AgeGroup %in% c(\"16-20\", \"21-25\", \"26-30\")", "AgeGroup")

Or some equivalent.

Is there a way to do this in R? It would simplify a lot of code I am writing if I could. Thanks!

Upvotes: 1

Views: 92

Answers (1)

Branden Williams
Branden Williams

Reputation: 93

Thank you to r2evans! Here's my solution:

resultPrint <- function(qualifier, groupColumn) {
  return(results %>% filter_(qualifier) %>%
           group_by_(.dots = groupColumn) %>% summarize(count=n()))
}

filterClause = quote(AgeGroup %in% c("16-20", "21-25", "26-30"))
stuff <- resultPrint(filterClause, quote(AgeGroup))

Thank you!!

Upvotes: 1

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