R help - Nov 2008 - # values used in a function in tapply

Hello,

I am using tapply to pull out data by the day of week and then perform
functions (e.g. mean). I would like to have the number of values used for
the calcuation for the functions, sorted by each day of week.  A number of
entries in any given column are NAs.

I have tried the following code and simple variants with no luck.

for (i in 1:length(a[1,])){
 x<-tapply(a[,i],a[,1],mean, na.rm=TRUE)
 amn<-tapply(a[,i],a[,1],colSums(!is.na),na.rm=T)}
Adding an explicit argument to colSums(!is.na) {e.g. colSums(!is.na(a[,i]))}
produced an error that said colSums was not a function. Trying an
imbedded tapply instead of the colSums didn't work either. Using the sum
function added the values, not the count of the values.

Thank you for any suggestions,
Stephanie

	[[alternative HTML version deleted]]

Try something like this:

amn <- tapply(a[,i], a[, 1], colSums, na.rm=TRUE))

but since the result of the tapply is a vector, you can also use:

amn <- tapply(a[,i], a[, 1],sum, na.rm=TRUE))

On Fri, Nov 14, 2008 at 6:47 PM, Stephanie Shaw <slshaw23 at gmail.com>
wrote:
> Hello,
>
> I am using tapply to pull out data by the day of week and then perform
> functions (e.g. mean). I would like to have the number of values used for
> the calcuation for the functions, sorted by each day of week.  A number of
> entries in any given column are NAs.
>
> I have tried the following code and simple variants with no luck.
>
> for (i in 1:length(a[1,])){
>  x<-tapply(a[,i],a[,1],mean, na.rm=TRUE)
>  amn<-tapply(a[,i],a[,1],colSums(!is.na),na.rm=T)}
> Adding an explicit argument to colSums(!is.na) {e.g.
colSums(!is.na(a[,i]))}
> produced an error that said colSums was not a function. Trying an
> imbedded tapply instead of the colSums didn't work either. Using the
sum
> function added the values, not the count of the values.
>
> Thank you for any suggestions,
> Stephanie
>
>        [[alternative HTML version deleted]]
>
> ______________________________________________
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> PLEASE do read the posting guide
http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html
> and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
>


-- 
Jim Holtman
Cincinnati, OH
+1 513 646 9390

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