CODEWITHSUNDEEP
r
Max
Max

Reputation: 111

R - Changing values in a column and then changing column type

So, I have an imported set of NBA data that I got using dataset <- read_csv(...). One of the columns named Experience contains both integers and characters, so its type is set to character. I need to change every "R" character to 0's, then set the column type of Experience to integer.

I'm just starting to use R, so I'm not quite sure what to do syntax-wise. Should I run a for all 'R' in "Experience" kind of loop? I'd know how to do it in Python, but I'm not sure how to do it in R. Thanks.

Upvotes: 0

Views: 99

Answers (1)

vaettchen
vaettchen

Reputation: 7659

The way you describe it, this should work:

dataset[ dataset$Experience == "R", "Experience" ] <- 0

does the replacement job in R's vectorised manner:

dataset[ dataset$Experience == "R", ] (the last comma matters) selects all rows in the data frame where the value of the column Experience is equal to "R".

dataset[ , "Experience" ] (again, the comma matters) selects the values in column "Experience".

Combined into one, exactly the values you are targeting are selected, and then the value 0 is assigned where the "R" was.

You can find out more with the built-in help: ?"[.data.frame".

And then,

dataset$Experience <- as.integer( dataset$Experience )

takes care of the conversion.

Sample:

dataset <- structure(list(bla = 1:10, Experience = c("50", "49", "R", "47", "46", "R", "44", "R", "42", "41")), .Names = c("bla", "Experience"), row.names = c(NA, -10L), class = "data.frame")
dataset
   bla Experience
1    1         50
2    2         49
3    3          R
4    4         47
5    5         46
6    6          R
7    7         44
8    8          R
9    9         42
10  10         41
dataset[ dataset$Experience == "R", "Experience" ] <- 0
dataset$Experience <- as.integer( dataset$Experience )
str( dataset )
'data.frame':   10 obs. of  2 variables:
 $ bla       : int  1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
 $ Experience: int  50 49 0 47 46 0 44 0 42 41

Upvotes: 1

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