R: Read Data Values

scan {base} | R Documentation

## Read Data Values

### Description

Read data into a vector or list from the console or file.

### Usage

    scan(file = "", what = double(0), nmax = -1, n = -1, sep = "",
         quote = if(identical(sep, "\n")) "" else "'\"", dec = ".",
         skip = 0, nlines = 0, na.strings = "NA",
         flush = FALSE, fill = FALSE, strip.white = FALSE,
         quiet = FALSE, blank.lines.skip = TRUE, multi.line = TRUE,
         comment.char = "", allowEscapes = FALSE,
         encoding = "unknown")

### Arguments

`file` | the name of a file to read data values from. If the specified file is `""`, then input is taken from the keyboard (or whatever `stdin()` reads if input is redirected or R is embedded). (In this case input can be terminated by a blank line or an EOF signal, `Ctrl-D` on Unix and `Ctrl-Z` on Windows.) Otherwise, the file name is interpreted relative to the current working directory (given by `getwd()`), unless it specifies an absolute path. Tilde-expansion is performed where supported. When running R from a script, `file="stdin"` can be used to refer to the process's `stdin` file stream. Alternatively, `file` can be a `connection`, which will be opened if necessary, and if so closed at the end of the function call. Whatever mode the connection is opened in, any of LF, CRLF or CR will be accepted as the EOL marker for a line and so will match `sep = "\n"`. `file` can also be a complete URL. To read a data file not in the current encoding (for example a Latin-1 file in a UTF-8 locale or conversely) use a `file` connection setting the `encoding` argument.
`what` | the type of `what` gives the type of data to be read. The supported types are `logical`, `integer`, `numeric`, `complex`, `character`, `raw` and `list`. If `what` is a list, it is assumed that the lines of the data file are records each containing `length(what)` items (‘fields’) and the list components should have elements which are one of the first six types listed or `NULL`, see section ‘Details’ below.
`nmax` | integer: the maximum number of data values to be read, or if `what` is a list, the maximum number of records to be read. If omitted or not positive or an invalid value for an integer (and `nlines` is not set to a positive value), `scan` will read to the end of `file`.
`n` | integer: the maximum number of data values to be read, defaulting to no limit. Invalid values will be ignored.
`sep` | by default, scan expects to read white-space delimited input fields. Alternatively, `sep` can be used to specify a character which delimits fields. A field is always delimited by an end-of-line marker unless it is quoted. If specified this should be the empty character string (the default) or `NULL` or a character string containing just one single-byte character.
`quote` | the set of quoting characters as a single character string or `NULL`. In a multibyte locale the quoting characters must be ASCII (single-byte).
`dec` | decimal point character. This should be a character string containing just one single-byte character. (`NULL` and a zero-length character vector are also accepted, and taken as the default.)
`skip` | the number of lines of the input file to skip before beginning to read data values.
`nlines` | if positive, the maximum number of lines of data to be read.
`na.strings` | character vector. Elements of this vector are to be interpreted as missing (`NA`) values. Blank fields are also considered to be missing values in logical, integer, numeric and complex fields.
`flush` | logical: if `TRUE`, `scan` will flush to the end of the line after reading the last of the fields requested. This allows putting comments after the last field, but precludes putting more that one record on a line.
`fill` | logical: if `TRUE`, `scan` will implicitly add empty fields to any lines with fewer fields than implied by `what`.
`strip.white` | vector of logical value(s) corresponding to items in the `what` argument. It is used only when `sep` has been specified, and allows the stripping of leading and trailing white space from `character` fields (`numeric` fields are always stripped). If `strip.white` is of length 1, it applies to all fields; otherwise, if `strip.white[i]` is `TRUE` and the `i`-th field is of mode character (because `what[i]` is) then the leading and trailing white space from field `i` is stripped.
`quiet` | logical: if `FALSE` (default), scan() will print a line, saying how many items have been read.
`blank.lines.skip` | logical: if `TRUE` blank lines in the input are ignored, except when counting `skip` and `nlines`.
`multi.line` | logical. Only used if `what` is a list. If `FALSE`, all of a record must appear on one line (but more than one record can appear on a single line). Note that using `fill = TRUE` implies that a record will terminated at the end of a line.
`comment.char` | character: a character vector of length one containing a single character or an empty string. Use `""` to turn off the interpretation of comments altogether (the default).
`allowEscapes` | logical. Should C-style escapes such as `\n` be processed (the default) or read verbatim? Note that if not within quotes these could be interpreted as a delimiter (but not as a comment character). The escapes which are interpreted are the control characters `\a, \b, \f, \n, \r, \t, \v` and octal and hexadecimal representations like `\040` and `\0x2A`. Any other escaped character is treated as itself, including backslash.
`encoding` | encoding to be assumed for input strings. If the value is `"latin1"` or `"UTF-8"` it is used to mark character strings as known to be in Latin-1 or UTF-8: it is not used to re-encode the input. To do the latter, specify the encoding as part of the connection `con` or via `options(encoding=)`: see the example under `file`.

### Details

The value of `what` can be a list of types, in which case `scan` returns a list of vectors with the types given by the types of the elements in `what`. This provides a way of reading columnar data. If any of the types is `NULL`, the corresponding field is skipped (but a `NULL` component appears in the result).

The type of `what` or its components can be one of the six atomic vector types or `NULL` (see `is.atomic`).

‘White space’ is defined for the purposes of this function as one or more contiguous characters from the set space, horizontal tab, carriage return and line feed. It does not include form feed or vertical tab, but in Latin-1 and Windows 8-bit locales 'space' includes non-breaking space.

Empty numeric fields are always regarded as missing values. Empty character fields are scanned as empty character vectors, unless `na.strings` contains `""` when they are regarded as missing values.

The allowed input for a numeric field is optional whitespace followed either `NA` or an optional sign followed by a decimal or hexadecimal constant (see NumericConstants), or `NaN`, `Inf` or `infinity` (ignoring case). Out-of-range values are recorded as `Inf`, `-Inf` or `0`.

For an integer field the allowed input is optional whitespace, followed by either `NA` or an optional sign and one or more digits (`0-9`): all out-of-range values are converted to `NA_integer_`.

If `sep` is the default (`""`), the character `\` in a quoted string escapes the following character, so quotes may be included in the string by escaping them.

If `sep` is non-default, the fields may be quoted in the style of ‘.csv’ files where separators inside quotes (`''` or `""`) are ignored and quotes may be put inside strings by doubling them. However, if `sep = "\n"` it is assumed by default that one wants to read entire lines verbatim.

Quoting is only interpreted in character fields and in `NULL` fields (which might be skipping character fields).

Note that since `sep` is a separator and not a terminator, reading a file by `scan("foo", sep="\n", blank.lines.skip=FALSE)` will give an empty final line if the file ends in a linefeed and not if it does not. This might not be what you expected; see also `readLines`.

If `comment.char` occurs (except inside a quoted character field), it signals that the rest of the line should be regarded as a comment and be discarded. Lines beginning with a comment character (possibly after white space with the default separator) are treated as blank lines.

There is a check for a user interrupt every 1000 lines if `what` is a list, otherwise every 10000 items.

### Value

if `what` is a list, a list of the same length and same names (as any) as `what`.
Otherwise, a vector of the type of `what`.
Character strings in the result will have a declared encoding if `encoding` is `"latin1"` or `"UTF-8"`.

### Note

The default for `multi.line` differs from S. To read one record per line, use `flush = TRUE` and `multi.line = FALSE`. (Note that quoted character strings can still include embedded newlines.)

If number of items is not specified, the internal mechanism re-allocates memory in powers of two and so could use up to three times as much memory as needed. (It needs both old and new copies.) If you can, specify either `n` or `nmax` whenever inputting a large vector, and `nmax` or `nlines` when inputting a large list.

Using `scan` on an open connection to read partial lines can lose chars: use an explicit separator to avoid this.

Having `nul` bytes in fields (including `\0` if `allowEscapes = TRUE`) may lead to interpretation of the field being terminated at the `nul`. They not normally present in text files – see `readBin`.

### References

Becker, R. A., Chambers, J. M. and Wilks, A. R. (1988) The New S Language. Wadsworth & Brooks/Cole.

### See Also

`read.table` for more user-friendly reading of data matrices; `readLines` to read a file a line at a time. `write`.

`Quotes` for the details of C-style escape sequences.

`readChar` and `readBin` to read fixed or variable length character strings or binary representations of numbers a few at a time from a connection.

### Examples

    cat("TITLE extra line", "2 3 5 7", "11 13 17", file="ex.data", sep="\n")
    pp <- scan("ex.data", skip = 1, quiet= TRUE)
    scan("ex.data", skip = 1)
    scan("ex.data", skip = 1, nlines=1) # only 1 line after the skipped one
    scan("ex.data", what = list("","","")) # flush is F -> read "7"
    scan("ex.data", what = list("","",""), flush = TRUE)
    unlink("ex.data") # tidy up

[Package base version 2.8.1 Index]