R help - Oct 2009 - Way of handling empty value when reading in CSV

I believe I may be overlooking something simple in order address this, but I
have searched RSeek.org and using "?", but cannot seem to find
anything discussing this one.


I am using read.csv to read in a csv file.  Evidently in places there is nothing
between the commas, so that when the data is read in the data.frame produced has
values that are empty.


Is there a way to fix this when reading the data via "read.csv"?  I
looked at all the options mentioned in ?read.csv, but did not see anything to
address this case, e.g.


home,sqr_footage,cost
1,1500,150000
2,2000,200000
3,,300000
4,3500,350000
5,4000,450000


I would like for the empty cells to have a value of "NA" when they are
read in.


Thank you for any feedback and insights.

I saved your data as test.csv, and 
> read.csv("~/test.csv", header = TRUE)
  home sqr_footage   cost
1    1        1500 150000
2    2        2000 200000
3    3          NA 300000
4    4        3500 350000
5    5        4000 450000

I am using R 2.8.1, old I know... but maybe something else is going on?  Do you
really get a blank when you read in your sample data?

Erik 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: r-help-bounces at r-project.org [mailto:r-help-bounces at
r-project.org]
> On Behalf Of Jason Rupert
> Sent: Tuesday, October 06, 2009 11:39 AM
> To: R-help at r-project.org
> Subject: [R] Way of handling empty value when reading in CSV
> 
> I believe I may be overlooking something simple in order address this, but
> I have searched RSeek.org and using "?", but cannot seem to find
anything
> discussing this one.
> 
> 
> I am using read.csv to read in a csv file.  Evidently in places there is
> nothing between the commas, so that when the data is read in the
> data.frame produced has values that are empty.
> 
> 
> Is there a way to fix this when reading the data via "read.csv"? 
I looked
> at all the options mentioned in ?read.csv, but did not see anything to
> address this case, e.g.
> 
> 
> home,sqr_footage,cost
> 1,1500,150000
> 2,2000,200000
> 3,,300000
> 4,3500,350000
> 5,4000,450000
> 
> 
> I would like for the empty cells to have a value of "NA" when
they are
> read in.
> 
> 
> Thank you for any feedback and insights.
> 
> ______________________________________________
> 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.

Well, I guess I posted a poor example.

This example is a little closer:
home,sqr_footage,cost,color,exterior
1,1500,150000,,Siding
2,2000,200000,Red,Brick
3,,300000,Grey,Brick
4,3500,350000,Blue,
5,4000,450000,Red,Brick

This one actually shows the presence of the null fields that are loaded. 

Sorry again for the poor 1st example. 

Thank you again for your time and insight. 



--- On Tue, 10/6/09, Erik Iverson <eiverson at NMDP.ORG> wrote:
> From: Erik Iverson <eiverson at NMDP.ORG>
> Subject: RE: [R] Way of handling empty value when reading in CSV
> To: "Jason Rupert" <jasonkrupert at yahoo.com>,
"R-help at r-project.org" <R-help at r-project.org>
> Date: Tuesday, October 6, 2009, 11:42 AM
> I saved your data as test.csv, and 
> 
> > read.csv("~/test.csv", header = TRUE)
> ? home sqr_footage???cost
> 1? ? 1? ? ? ? 1500 150000
> 2? ? 2? ? ? ? 2000 200000
> 3? ? 3? ? ? ? ? NA
> 300000
> 4? ? 4? ? ? ? 3500 350000
> 5? ? 5? ? ? ? 4000 450000
> 
> I am using R 2.8.1, old I know... but maybe something else
> is going on?? Do you really get a blank when you read
> in your sample data? 
> 
> Erik 
> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: r-help-bounces at r-project.org
> [mailto:r-help-bounces at r-project.org]
> > On Behalf Of Jason Rupert
> > Sent: Tuesday, October 06, 2009 11:39 AM
> > To: R-help at r-project.org
> > Subject: [R] Way of handling empty value when reading
> in CSV
> > 
> > I believe I may be overlooking something simple in
> order address this, but
> > I have searched RSeek.org and using "?", but cannot
> seem to find anything
> > discussing this one.
> > 
> > 
> > I am using read.csv to read in a csv file.?
> Evidently in places there is
> > nothing between the commas, so that when the data is
> read in the
> > data.frame produced has values that are empty.
> > 
> > 
> > Is there a way to fix this when reading the data via
> "read.csv"?? I looked
> > at all the options mentioned in ?read.csv, but did not
> see anything to
> > address this case, e.g.
> > 
> > 
> > home,sqr_footage,cost
> > 1,1500,150000
> > 2,2000,200000
> > 3,,300000
> > 4,3500,350000
> > 5,4000,450000
> > 
> > 
> > I would like for the empty cells to have a value of
> "NA" when they are
> > read in.
> > 
> > 
> > Thank you for any feedback and insights.
> > 
> > ______________________________________________
> > 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.
>