R devel - Nov 2014 - R string comparisons may vary with platform (plain text)

A colleague?s R program behaved differently when I ran it, and we thought
we traced it probably to different results from string comparisons as
below, with different R versions.  However the platforms also differed.  A
friend ran it on a few machines and found that the comparison behavior
didn?t correlate with R version, but rather with platform.

I wonder if you?ve seen this.  If it?s not some setting I?m unaware of,
maybe someone should look into it.  Sorry I haven?t taken the time to read
the source code myself.

Thanks,
Stuart

R version 3.0.2 (2013-09-25) -- "Frisbee Sailing"
Platform: x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu (64-bit)
Sys.getlocale()
[1] 
"LC_CTYPE=en_US.UTF-8;LC_NUMERIC=C;LC_TIME=en_US.UTF-8;LC_COLLATE=en_US.UTF
-8;LC_MONETARY=en_US.UTF-8;LC_MESSAGES=en_US.UTF-8;LC_PAPER=en_US.UTF-8;LC_
NAME=C;LC_ADDRESS=C;LC_TELEPHONE=C;LC_MEASUREMENT=en_US.UTF-8;LC_IDENTIFICA
TION=C"

"-1" > "1"
[1] TRUE

"-1" <"1"
[1] FALSE

"1" < "-1"
[1] TRUE

"1" < "-"
[1] FALSE

Vs.

R version 3.1.1 (2014-07-10) ? ?Sock it to Me"
Platform: x86_64-redhat-linux-gnu (64-bit)
Sys.getlocale()
[1] 
"LC_CTYPE=en_US.utf8;LC_NUMERIC=C;LC_TIME=en_US.utf8;LC_COLLATE=en_US.utf8
;LC_MONETARY=en_US.utf8;LC_MESSAGES=en_US.utf8;LC_PAPER=en_US.utf8;LC_NAME
=C;LC_ADDRESS=C;LC_TELEPHONE=C;LC_MEASUREMENT=en_US.utf8;LC_IDENTIFICATION
=C"

"-1" > "1"
[1] FALSE

"-1" <"1"
[1] TRUE

"1" < "-1"
[1] FALSE

"1" < "-"
[1] FALSE

On 22/11/2014, 2:59 PM, Stuart Ambler wrote:
> A colleague?s R program behaved differently when I ran it, and we thought
> we traced it probably to different results from string comparisons as
> below, with different R versions.  However the platforms also differed.  A
> friend ran it on a few machines and found that the comparison behavior
> didn?t correlate with R version, but rather with platform.
> 
> I wonder if you?ve seen this.  If it?s not some setting I?m unaware of,
> maybe someone should look into it.  Sorry I haven?t taken the time to read
> the source code myself.
Looks like a collation order issue.  See ?Comparison.

Duncan Murdoch
> Thanks,
> Stuart
> 
> R version 3.0.2 (2013-09-25) -- "Frisbee Sailing"
> Platform: x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu (64-bit)
> Sys.getlocale()
> [1] 
>
"LC_CTYPE=en_US.UTF-8;LC_NUMERIC=C;LC_TIME=en_US.UTF-8;LC_COLLATE=en_US.UTF
> -8;LC_MONETARY=en_US.UTF-8;LC_MESSAGES=en_US.UTF-8;LC_PAPER=en_US.UTF-8;LC_
> NAME=C;LC_ADDRESS=C;LC_TELEPHONE=C;LC_MEASUREMENT=en_US.UTF-8;LC_IDENTIFICA
> TION=C"
> 
> "-1" > "1"
> [1] TRUE
> 
> "-1" <"1"
> [1] FALSE
> 
> "1" < "-1"
> [1] TRUE
> 
> "1" < "-"
> [1] FALSE
> 
> Vs.
> 
> R version 3.1.1 (2014-07-10) ? ?Sock it to Me"
> Platform: x86_64-redhat-linux-gnu (64-bit)
> Sys.getlocale()
> [1] 
>
"LC_CTYPE=en_US.utf8;LC_NUMERIC=C;LC_TIME=en_US.utf8;LC_COLLATE=en_US.utf8
> ;LC_MONETARY=en_US.utf8;LC_MESSAGES=en_US.utf8;LC_PAPER=en_US.utf8;LC_NAME
> =C;LC_ADDRESS=C;LC_TELEPHONE=C;LC_MEASUREMENT=en_US.utf8;LC_IDENTIFICATION
> =C"
> 
> "-1" > "1"
> [1] FALSE
> 
> "-1" <"1"
> [1] TRUE
> 
> "1" < "-1"
> [1] FALSE
> 
> "1" < "-"
> [1] FALSE
> 
> ______________________________________________
> R-devel at r-project.org mailing list
> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel
>

You mean where it says that some platforms may not respect the locale (I
assume, though don?t know, that en_US.UTF-8 and en_US.utf8 would be the
same)?  But I gather that the general problem has been looked into and is
difficult to solve; thanks.

On 11/22/14, 12:42 PM, "Duncan Murdoch" <murdoch.duncan at
gmail.com> wrote:
>On 22/11/2014, 2:59 PM, Stuart Ambler wrote:
>> A colleague?s R program behaved differently when I ran it, and we
>>thought
>> we traced it probably to different results from string comparisons as
>> below, with different R versions.  However the platforms also differed.
>> A
>> friend ran it on a few machines and found that the comparison behavior
>> didn?t correlate with R version, but rather with platform.
>> 
>> I wonder if you?ve seen this.  If it?s not some setting I?m unaware of,
>> maybe someone should look into it.  Sorry I haven?t taken the time to
>>read
>> the source code myself.
>
>Looks like a collation order issue.  See ?Comparison.
>
>Duncan Murdoch
>
>> Thanks,
>> Stuart
>> 
>> R version 3.0.2 (2013-09-25) -- "Frisbee Sailing"
>> Platform: x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu (64-bit)
>> Sys.getlocale()
>> [1] 
>> 
>>"LC_CTYPE=en_US.UTF-8;LC_NUMERIC=C;LC_TIME=en_US.UTF-8;LC_COLLATE=en_US.U
>>TF
>> 
>>-8;LC_MONETARY=en_US.UTF-8;LC_MESSAGES=en_US.UTF-8;LC_PAPER=en_US.UTF-8;L
>>C_
>> 
>>NAME=C;LC_ADDRESS=C;LC_TELEPHONE=C;LC_MEASUREMENT=en_US.UTF-8;LC_IDENTIFI
>>CA
>> TION=C"
>> 
>> "-1" > "1"
>> [1] TRUE
>> 
>> "-1" <"1"
>> [1] FALSE
>> 
>> "1" < "-1"
>> [1] TRUE
>> 
>> "1" < "-"
>> [1] FALSE
>> 
>> Vs.
>> 
>> R version 3.1.1 (2014-07-10) ? ?Sock it to Me"
>> Platform: x86_64-redhat-linux-gnu (64-bit)
>> Sys.getlocale()
>> [1] 
>> 
>>"LC_CTYPE=en_US.utf8;LC_NUMERIC=C;LC_TIME=en_US.utf8;LC_COLLATE=en_US.utf
>>8
>> 
>>;LC_MONETARY=en_US.utf8;LC_MESSAGES=en_US.utf8;LC_PAPER=en_US.utf8;LC_NAM
>>E
>> 
>>=C;LC_ADDRESS=C;LC_TELEPHONE=C;LC_MEASUREMENT=en_US.utf8;LC_IDENTIFICATIO
>>N
>> =C"
>> 
>> "-1" > "1"
>> [1] FALSE
>> 
>> "-1" <"1"
>> [1] TRUE
>> 
>> "1" < "-1"
>> [1] FALSE
>> 
>> "1" < "-"
>> [1] FALSE
>> 
>> ______________________________________________
>> R-devel at r-project.org mailing list
>> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel
>> 
>

On Sat, Nov 22, 2014 at 12:42 PM, Duncan Murdoch
<murdoch.duncan at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 22/11/2014, 2:59 PM, Stuart Ambler wrote:
>> A colleague?s R program behaved differently when I ran it, and we
thought
>> we traced it probably to different results from string comparisons as
>> below, with different R versions.  However the platforms also differed.
A
>> friend ran it on a few machines and found that the comparison behavior
>> didn?t correlate with R version, but rather with platform.
>>
>> I wonder if you?ve seen this.  If it?s not some setting I?m unaware of,
>> maybe someone should look into it.  Sorry I haven?t taken the time to
read
>> the source code myself.
>
> Looks like a collation order issue.  See ?Comparison.
With the oddity that both platforms use what look like similar locales:

LC_COLLATE=en_US.UTF-8
LC_COLLATE=en_US.utf8

/Henrik
>
> Duncan Murdoch
>
>> Thanks,
>> Stuart
>>
>> R version 3.0.2 (2013-09-25) -- "Frisbee Sailing"
>> Platform: x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu (64-bit)
>> Sys.getlocale()
>> [1]
>>
"LC_CTYPE=en_US.UTF-8;LC_NUMERIC=C;LC_TIME=en_US.UTF-8;LC_COLLATE=en_US.UTF
>>
-8;LC_MONETARY=en_US.UTF-8;LC_MESSAGES=en_US.UTF-8;LC_PAPER=en_US.UTF-8;LC_
>>
NAME=C;LC_ADDRESS=C;LC_TELEPHONE=C;LC_MEASUREMENT=en_US.UTF-8;LC_IDENTIFICA
>> TION=C"
>>
>> "-1" > "1"
>> [1] TRUE
>>
>> "-1" <"1"
>> [1] FALSE
>>
>> "1" < "-1"
>> [1] TRUE
>>
>> "1" < "-"
>> [1] FALSE
>>
>> Vs.
>>
>> R version 3.1.1 (2014-07-10) ? ?Sock it to Me"
>> Platform: x86_64-redhat-linux-gnu (64-bit)
>> Sys.getlocale()
>> [1]
>>
"LC_CTYPE=en_US.utf8;LC_NUMERIC=C;LC_TIME=en_US.utf8;LC_COLLATE=en_US.utf8
>>
;LC_MONETARY=en_US.utf8;LC_MESSAGES=en_US.utf8;LC_PAPER=en_US.utf8;LC_NAME
>>
=C;LC_ADDRESS=C;LC_TELEPHONE=C;LC_MEASUREMENT=en_US.utf8;LC_IDENTIFICATION
>> =C"
>>
>> "-1" > "1"
>> [1] FALSE
>>
>> "-1" <"1"
>> [1] TRUE
>>
>> "1" < "-1"
>> [1] FALSE
>>
>> "1" < "-"
>> [1] FALSE
>>
>> ______________________________________________
>> R-devel at r-project.org mailing list
>> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel
>>
>
> ______________________________________________
> R-devel at r-project.org mailing list
> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel