I am cleaning up some character data to convert to
dates using chron. The regex that I am using work fine
but there should be a better way to do this. Can
anyone suggest a cleaner bit of code than the gsub,
sub approach? Thanks
#Test Run on dates.
xx <- c("May 1, 2007",
"May 2, 2007",
"May 3, 2007",
"May 4, 2007",
"May 5, 2007",
"May 6, 2007",
"May 7, 2007",
"May 8, 2007",
"May 9, 2007",
"May 10, 2007",
"May 11, 2007",
"May 12, 2007")
yy <- gsub(" +", "/", xx) ; yy
zz <- sub(",", "", yy) ; zz
library(chron)
ttdates <- chron(zz, format = c(dates = "mon/d/y"))
On 10-May-08 16:49:20, John Kane wrote:> I am cleaning up some character data to convert to > dates using chron. The regex that I am using work fine > but there should be a better way to do this. Can > anyone suggest a cleaner bit of code than the gsub, > sub approach? Thanks > >#Test Run on dates. > xx <- c("May 1, 2007", > "May 2, 2007", > "May 3, 2007", > "May 4, 2007", > "May 5, 2007", > "May 6, 2007", > "May 7, 2007", > "May 8, 2007", > "May 9, 2007", > "May 10, 2007", > "May 11, 2007", > "May 12, 2007") > yy <- gsub(" +", "/", xx) ; yy > zz <- sub(",", "", yy) ; zzYou can do it in one stroke with gsub(",*[ ]+", "/", xx) [1] "May/1/2007" "May/2/2007" "May/3/2007" "May/4/2007" [5] "May/5/2007" "May/6/2007" "May/7/2007" "May/8/2007" [9] "May/9/2007" "May/10/2007" "May/11/2007" "May/12/2007"> library(chron) > ttdates <- chron(zz, format = c(dates = "mon/d/y"))Best wishes, Ted -------------------------------------------------------------------- E-Mail: (Ted Harding) <Ted.Harding at manchester.ac.uk> Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 Date: 10-May-08 Time: 18:14:33 ------------------------------ XFMail ------------------------------
Try this (no gsub required): as.chron(as.Date(xx, "%b %d, %Y")) On Sat, May 10, 2008 at 12:49 PM, John Kane <jrkrideau at yahoo.ca> wrote:> I am cleaning up some character data to convert to > dates using chron. The regex that I am using work fine > but there should be a better way to do this. Can > anyone suggest a cleaner bit of code than the gsub, > sub approach? Thanks > > #Test Run on dates. > xx <- c("May 1, 2007", > "May 2, 2007", > "May 3, 2007", > "May 4, 2007", > "May 5, 2007", > "May 6, 2007", > "May 7, 2007", > "May 8, 2007", > "May 9, 2007", > "May 10, 2007", > "May 11, 2007", > "May 12, 2007") > yy <- gsub(" +", "/", xx) ; yy > zz <- sub(",", "", yy) ; zz > library(chron) > ttdates <- chron(zz, format = c(dates = "mon/d/y")) > > ______________________________________________ > R-help at r-project.org mailing list > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help > PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html > and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. >
Thanks to Gabor Grothendieck & Ted Harding. both solutions work very nicely. --- Gabor Grothendieck <ggrothendieck at gmail.com> wrote:> Try this (no gsub required): > > as.chron(as.Date(xx, "%b %d, %Y")) > > On Sat, May 10, 2008 at 12:49 PM, John Kane > <jrkrideau at yahoo.ca> wrote: > > I am cleaning up some character data to convert to > > dates using chron. The regex that I am using work > fine > > but there should be a better way to do this. Can > > anyone suggest a cleaner bit of code than the > gsub, > > sub approach? Thanks > > > > #Test Run on dates. > > xx <- c("May 1, 2007", > > "May 2, 2007", > > "May 3, 2007", > > "May 4, 2007", > > "May 5, 2007", > > "May 6, 2007", > > "May 7, 2007", > > "May 8, 2007", > > "May 9, 2007", > > "May 10, 2007", > > "May 11, 2007", > > "May 12, 2007") > > yy <- gsub(" +", "/", xx) ; yy > > zz <- sub(",", "", yy) ; zz > > library(chron) > > ttdates <- chron(zz, format = c(dates > "mon/d/y")) > > > > ______________________________________________ > > R-help at r-project.org mailing list > > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help > > PLEASE do read the posting guide > http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html > > and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, > reproducible code. > > >__________________________________________________________________ [[elided Yahoo spam]]