R: Conditional Element Selection

ifelse {base} | R Documentation

## Conditional Element Selection

### Description

`ifelse` returns a value with the same shape as `test` which is filled with elements selected from either `yes` or `no` depending on whether the element of `test` is `TRUE` or `FALSE`.

### Usage

    ifelse(test, yes, no)

### Arguments

`test` | an object which can be coerced to logical mode.
`yes` | return values for true elements of `test`.
`no` | return values for false elements of `test`.

### Details

If `yes` or `no` are too short, their elements are recycled. `yes` will be evaluated if and only if any element of `test` is true, and analogously for `no`.

Missing values in `test` give missing values in the result.

### Value

A vector of the same length and attributes (including dimensions and `"class"`) as `test` and data values from the values of `yes` or `no`. The mode of the answer will be coerced from logical to accommodate first any values taken from `yes` and then any values taken from `no`.

### Warning

The mode of the result may depend on the value of `test` (see the examples), and the class attribute (see `oldClass`) of the result is taken from `test` and may be inappropriate for the values selected from `yes` and `no`.

Sometimes it is better to use a construction such as `(tmp <- yes; tmp[!test] <- no[!test]; tmp)`, possibly extended to handle missing values in `test`.

### References

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

### See Also

`if`.

### Examples

    x <- c(6:-4)
    sqrt(x)  #- gives warning
    sqrt(ifelse(x >= 0, x, NA))  # no warning

    ## Note: the following also gives the warning !
    ifelse(x >= 0, sqrt(x), NA)

    ## example of different return modes:
    yes <- 1:3
    no <- pi^(0:3)
    typeof(ifelse(NA, yes, no))    # logical
    typeof(ifelse(TRUE, yes, no))  # integer
    typeof(ifelse(FALSE, yes, no)) # double

[Package base version 2.15.1 Index]