I was thinking, b <- subset(mtcars, select=c("mpg", "cyl", "drat", "wt"))
Yours is even simpler. :) Thanks Mike On Fri, Apr 12, 2013 at 4:06 PM, Berend Hasselman <b...@xs4all.nl> wrote: > > On 12-04-2013, at 21:56, C W <tmrs...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > What if my data is much larger, and I don't know what column number but > know its name? Do I have to grep its by name? > > How about subset()? Is that what people commonly use? > > > > Continuing with mtcars and the desired columns > > b <- mtcars[,c("mpg","cyl","drat","wt")] > > Berend > > > Mike > > > > On Fri, Apr 12, 2013 at 3:44 PM, Berend Hasselman <b...@xs4all.nl> wrote: > > > > On 12-04-2013, at 21:32, C W <tmrs...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > > > Dear list, > > > > > > I want the 1st, 2nd, 5th, and 6th columns of mtcars. After copying > them, > > > the columns become numeric class rather than data frame. > > > > > > But, when I copy rows, they data frame retains its class. Why is > this? I > > > don't see why copying rows vs columns is so different. > > > > > >> class(mtcars) > > > [1] "data.frame" > > >> head(mtcars) > > > mpg cyl disp hp drat wt qsec vs am gear carb > > > Mazda RX4 21.0 6 160 110 3.90 2.620 16.46 0 1 4 4 > > > Mazda RX4 Wag 21.0 6 160 110 3.90 2.875 17.02 0 1 4 4 > > > Datsun 710 22.8 4 108 93 3.85 2.320 18.61 1 1 4 1 > > > Hornet 4 Drive 21.4 6 258 110 3.08 3.215 19.44 1 0 3 1 > > > Hornet Sportabout 18.7 8 360 175 3.15 3.440 17.02 0 0 3 2 > > > Valiant 18.1 6 225 105 2.76 3.460 20.22 1 0 3 1 > > >> a <- mtcars$mpg > > >> class(a) > > > [1] "numeric" > > > > Here you are assigning a single column of mtcars, which is a numeric > vector, to another object. So that is a numeric vector. > > > > >> b <- mtcars[1:5, ] > > >> class(b) > > > [1] "data.frame" > > > > > > > Here you are assigning a couple of rows of the complete dataframe and > the result is a dataframe. > > > > If you want the 1st, 2nd, 5th, and 6th columns of mtcars in a new > datafrmae why don't you do this: > > > > a <- mtcars[,c(1,2,5,6)] > > > > then > > > > > class(a) > > [1] "data.frame" > > > > > > Berend > > > > > > > > [[alternative HTML version deleted]] ______________________________________________ R-help@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.