skip and n_max
Through skip and n_max you can control which part of your flat file you're actually importing into R.
-
skipspecifies the number of lines you're ignoring in the flat file before actually starting to import data. -
n_maxspecifies the number of lines you're actually importing.
Say for example you have a CSV file with 20 lines, and set skip = 2 and n_max = 3, you're only reading in lines 3, 4 and 5 of the file.
Watch out: Once you skip some lines, you also skip the first line that can contain column names!
potatoes.txt, a flat file with tab-delimited records and without column names, is available in your workspace.
This exercise is part of the course
Importing Data in R (Part 1)
Exercise instructions
Finish the first read_tsv() call to import observations 7, 8, 9, 10 and 11 from potatoes.txt.
Hands-on interactive exercise
Have a go at this exercise by completing this sample code.
# readr is already loaded
# Column names
properties <- c("area", "temp", "size", "storage", "method",
"texture", "flavor", "moistness")
# Import 5 observations from potatoes.txt: potatoes_fragment
potatoes_fragment <- read_tsv("potatoes.txt", skip = _, n_max = _, col_names = properties)