I am trying to write a function which, when passed the name of a dataframe and 
the name of a column of the dataframe, will allow me to work on the columns of 
a dataframe. I can not get my code to work. Please see the code below. Any help 
in getting the function to work would be appreciated.




mydf <- 
data.frame(id=c(1,2,3,4,5),sex=c("M","M","M","F","F"),age=c(20,34,43,32,21))
mydf
class(mydf)


myfun <- function(frame,var){
  call <- match.call()
  print(call)


  indx <- match(c("frame","var"),names(call),nomatch=0)
  print(indx)
  if(indx[1]==0) stop("Function called without sufficient arguments!")


  cat("I can get the name of the dataframe as a text string!\n")
  xx <- deparse(substitute(frame))
  print(xx)


  cat("I can get the name of the column as a text string!\n")
  yy <- deparse(substitute(var))
  print(yy)


  # This does not work.
  col <- xx[,"yy"]


  # Nor does this work.
  col <- xx[,yy]
  print(col)
}


myfun(mydf,age)

John David Sorkin M.D., Ph.D.
Professor of Medicine
Chief, Biostatistics and Informatics
University of Maryland School of Medicine Division of Gerontology and Geriatric 
Medicine
Baltimore VA Medical Center
10 North Greene Street
GRECC (BT/18/GR)
Baltimore, MD 21201-1524
(Phone) 410-605-7119
(Fax) 410-605-7913 (Please call phone number above prior to faxing) 




John David Sorkin M.D., Ph.D.
Professor of Medicine
Chief, Biostatistics and Informatics
University of Maryland School of Medicine Division of Gerontology and Geriatric 
Medicine
Baltimore VA Medical Center
10 North Greene Street
GRECC (BT/18/GR)
Baltimore, MD 21201-1524
(Phone) 410-605-7119
(Fax) 410-605-7913 (Please call phone number above prior to faxing) 





Confidentiality Statement:
This email message, including any attachments, is for the sole use of the 
intended recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information. 
Any unauthorized use, disclosure or distribution is prohibited. If you are not 
the intended recipient, please contact the sender by reply email and destroy 
all copies of the original message. 
______________________________________________
R-help@r-project.org mailing list -- To UNSUBSCRIBE and more, see
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.

Reply via email to