[R] colClasses: supressed 'NA'

[Uwe Ligges]

Anupam Tyagi wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> The colClasses seem to be supressing 'NA' vlaues. How do I fix this?
> 
> R script and first 5 lines of output is below.
> 
> File "test2.dat" has blanks that are read as "NA" when I do not use
> 'colClasses', but as blanks when I use 'colClasses'.


Well, you say it should be a factor, hence " " is taken as a level. 
Otherwise you have to specify na.string = " ".

Uwe Ligges


> temp.df <- read.fwf("test2.dat", width=c(10,1,1,1,1,2,2,3,3,1),  
> col.names=c("psu","losewt","maintain","fewcal","phyact","age","income","weight",
> "wtdesire","gender"),
> colClasses=c("factor","factor","factor","factor","factor","numeric","factor",
> "numeric","numeric","factor"),
> nrows=270000, comment.char="")
> 
> temp.df
>            psu losewt maintain fewcal phyact age income weight wtdesire gender
> 1   2003009323      2        2                52     05    220      220      1
> 2   2003005181      2        1      2      2  58     08    165      145      2
> 3   2003015942      2        1      4      1  76     05    142      130      2
> 4   2003011406      2        1      3      1  43     03    110      110      2
> 5   2003006786      1               4      1  49     06    178      145      2
> 
> ? why am I not getting missing values when I use 'colClasses'?
> 
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