Error in file(file, "rt") : invalid 'description' argument when reading csv files - r

I have seen posts about this issue before, but none exactly like the issue that I am having. This code has been working for me with previous versions of R. I recently updated my R and R Studio to versions R 4.2.1 and RStudio Desktop 2022.07.1+554, and now I am getting the subject error when I try to read in my data files. The data files all have the same filenames. I point to the top level directory and then the code goes down through the folder structure and pulls out all of the data files to be used by the rest of the program.
Also want to mention that I am not that well versed in R, so I may not be doing everything in the best manner. Any suggestions that anyone can provide would be most appreciated.
Here is my code to select the top level folder, search through those folders and then read the files which is generating the error.
wd <<- choose.dir(caption = "Select top level folder where your data is located")
setwd(wd)
#List the full path and filename of all files in the working directory and sub-directories that starts
#with "DINum" and ends with ".csv"
out_files <- list.files(pattern = "^DINum(.*)csv$", recursive = TRUE)
# initialise list to store csv files
list.data <- NULL
# create a loop to read in data
for (i in 1:length(out_files))
{
list.data[[i]]<-read.csv(out_files[i], check.names = TRUE)
}

I found a solution. I have been using read.csv from base R. I installed the readr package and tried read_csv and it is working fine. Not sure why read.csv no longer works, but from what I read online, read_csv is a better choice anyway for large data files. Thanks to everyone that tried to help me. I appreciate your time!

Related

Confusion while uploading the csv file in R [duplicate]

I have an excel file that I want to open in R. I tried both of these commands after saving the excel file as a csv file or a text file.
read.table() or read.csv()
I think part of the problem is where the file is located. I have it saved on the desk top. What am I missing here?
Here is the R output
In file(file, "rt") :
cannot open file 'Rtrial.csv': No such file or directory
> help.search("read.csv")
> read.csv("Rtrial.csv")
Error in file(file, "rt") : cannot open the connection
In addition: Warning message:
In file(file, "rt") :
cannot open file 'Rtrial.csv': No such file or directory
> read.table("tab")
To throw out another option, why not set the working directory (preferably via a script) to the desktop using setwd('C:\John\Desktop') and then read the files just using file names
Try
f <- file.choose()
to choose the file interactively and save the name in f.
Then run read.csv on the saved filename
d <- read.csv(f)
Sound like you just have an issue with the path. Include the full path, if you use backslashes they need to be escaped: "C:\\folder\\folder\\Desktop\\file.csv" or "C:/folder/folder/Desktop/file.csv".
myfile = read.csv("C:/folder/folder/Desktop/file.csv") # or read.table()
It may also be wise to avoid spaces and symbols in your file names, though I'm fairly certain spaces are OK.
I had to combine Maiasaura and Svun answers to get it to work: using setwd and escaping all the slashes and spaces.
setwd('C:\\Users\\firstname\ lastname\\Desktop\\folder1\\folder2\\folder3')
data = read.csv("file.csv")
data
This solved the issue for me.
Here is one way to do it. It uses the ability of R to construct file paths based on the platform and hence will work on both Mac OS and Windows. Moreover, you don't need to convert your xls file to csv, as there are many R packages that will help you read xls directly (e.g. gdata package).
# get user's home directory
home = setwd(Sys.getenv("HOME"));
# construct path to file
fpath = file.path(home, "Desktop", "RTrial.xls");
# load gdata library to read xls files
library(gdata);
# read xls file
Rtrial = read.xls(fpath);
Let me know if this works.
Save as in excel will keep the file open and lock it so you can't open it. Close the excel file or you won't be able to use it in R.
Give the full path and escape backslashes read.csv("c:\\users\\JoeUser\\Desktop\\JoesData.csv")
I have experienced that this error occurs when you either move the excel file to the destination other than where your r file is located or when you move your r file to the destination other than where your excel file is located.
Good Practice:
Keep your .r and .csv files in the same directory.
open your .r file from getting into its directory instead of opening the r file from rstuio's open file option.
You also have import Dataset option at Environment Block, just click there and get your required packages installed & from next time use this option to read datasets. You will not get this error again.
I also appreciate the above provided answers.
Another way of reading Excel including the new format xlsx could be the package speedR (https://r-forge.r-project.org/projects/speedr/). It is an interactive and visual data importer. Besides importing you can filter(subset) the existing objects from the R workspace.
My issue was very simple, the working directory was not the "Source" directory that was printed when the file ran. To fix this, you can use getwd() and setwd() to get your relative links working, or just use a full path when opening the csv.
print(getwd()) # Where does the code think it is?
setwd("~/Documents") # Where do I want my code to be?
dat = read.csv("~/Documents/Data Visualization/expDataAnalysis/one/ac1_survey.csv") #just make it work!
MAC OS It happened to me as well. I simply chose from the R toolbar MISC and then chose Change Working Directory. I was able to choose the directory that the .csv file was saved in. When I went back to the command line and typed getwd() the full directory was updated and correct and the read.csv function finally worked.
I had the same problem and when I checked the properties of the file on file explorer, it shows me the next message:
"Security: This file came from another computer and might be blocked to help protect this computer"
You click on the "Unblock" button and... you can access to the file from R without any problem, just using read.csv() function and from the directory specified as your working directory, even if is not the same as the file’s directory you are accessing to.
I just had this problem and I first switched to another directory and then switched back and the problem was fixed.
this work for me, accesing data from root. use double slash to access address.
dataset = read.csv('C:\\Users\\Desktop\\Machine Learning\\Data.csv')
Kindly check whether the file name has an extension for example:
abc.csv
if so remove the .csv extension.
set wd to the folder containing the file (~)
data<-read.csv("abc.csv")
Your data has been read the data object
In my case this very problem was raised by wrong spelling, lower case 'c:' instead of upper case 'C:' in the path. I corrected spelling and problem vanished.
You can add absolute path to the file
heisenberg <- read.csv(file="C:/Users/tiago/Desktop/sample_100000.csv")
If really want to run something like
heisenberg <- read.csv(file="sample_100000.csv")
then you'll have to change the working directory to match the place the .CSV file is at. More about it here.

Unable to read SPSS file from working directory

I have created a folder that has my dataset and set it as my working directory in Rstudio.
The dataset is an SPSS file which I named "Stats in R", I downloaded the packages foreign and Hmisc and tried to run to the following command to get the dataset:
data = read.csv("Stats in R.csv", header = TRUE)
…but the console showed the following message:
Error in file.choose() : file choice cancelled.
The problem is, my dataset is in the working directory but whenever I try to open it, R shows me an empty folder. I run the dir() command and instead of getting the directory content in the console, I get the following message:
character(0).
I really don't know what's the problem, the SPSS dataset is saved as a SAV file. I tried other extensions as well like CSV but nothing worked. Any suggestions, please? I really need to sort out that issue soon. Thank you!
It seems like you have some issue with your working directory - it's either not where you think it is, or you don't have full permissions and something is blocking the R Studio interface from accessing it.
Since you want to get this resolved quickly, the approach I would try is importing the file using the entire file path instead of the working directory, and then you can troubleshoot your WD when you have time.
This should work:
df <- read.csv("C://Users//Mina//Folder//Subfolder//Stats in R.csv", header = TRUE)

lapply and readxl Error

I am using readxl and lapply to import multiple .xlsx files into my environment. The following worked perfectly before but now when I try to re-run it, it gives me the following error:
Error in read_fun(path = path, sheet = sheet, limits = limits, shim = shim, :
Evaluation error: zip file 'data.xlsx' cannot be opened.
Code:
setwd("./Data Folder") #set path in order to avoid lapply error (This is what solved it last time I got errors)
Load all "Data Folder" datasets
library(readxl)
file.list <- list.files(path = "./Data Folder", pattern = '*.xlsx')
df.list <- lapply(file.list, read_excel)
I have checked if the path I entered is still correct and I didn't alter it by mistake. I have also tried to open the documents in the folder using excel and there is no problem with the files. Any ideas?
I have figured out the problem. I had two different tabs opened in RStudio, one was a R markdown and the other an R Script. I was trying to run the code in R markdown without realising and so I got the lapply error as the setwd was not saved in R's system.
If anyone has this problem at any point:
check if you are in an R Script
set the folder you are taking the data out from as your home folder
run the entire chunk in markdown at once

Import multiple csv files into R from zip folder

I know that this question has been asked exhaustively on this site, but I cannot find any question which addresses my problem.
I am trying to import multiple .csv files into R which are located in nested .zip files on my PC. The other questions seem to relate to importing a single file from a URL, which is not my issue.
I have set my working directory to the folder which contains the first .zip file, but there is another one inside of it, which then contains normal folders, and finally hundreds of .csv files which I am looking to access.
Up to now I have always manually extracted the data since I have no idea where to begin with unzipping code, but considering this folder contains around 20GB of data, I'm going to need to try something else.
Any help would be appreciated!
EDIT - CODE:
setwd("C:/docs/data/241115")
temp <- tempfile()
unzip("C:/docs/data/241115/Requested.zip",exdir=temp)
l = list.files(temp)
unzip("C:/docs/data/241115/Requested/Data Requested.zip",exdir=temp)
> error 1 in extracting from zip file
Without a minimal reproducible example it's difficult to know exactly where the problem lies. My best guess is that using a tempfile() is causing problems.
I would create a folder within your working directory to unzip the files to. You can do this from within R if you like:
# Create the folder 'temp' in your wd
dir.create("temp")
Now assuming your zip file is in the working directory I would unzip the first .zip in to temp in one step:
unzip("Requested.zip", exdir = "temp")
Finally, unzip the final .zip:
unzip("temp/Data Requested.zip", exdir = "temp")

Reading an Excel file into an R dataframe from a zipped folder

I have an Excel file (.xls extension) that is inside a zipped folder that I would like to read as a dataframe into R. I loaded the gdata library and set up my working directory to the folder that houses the zipped folder.
When I type in the following syntax:
data_frame1 <- read.xls( unz("./Data/Project1.zip","schools.xls"))
I get the following error messages:
Error in path.expand(xls) : invalid 'path' argument
Error in file.exists(tfn) : invalid 'file' argument
I'm guessing that I'm missing some arguments in the syntax, but I'm not entirely sure what else needs to be included.
Thanks for your help! This R newbie really appreciates it!
Unfortunately, after a quick survey of all the xls functions I know, there is no xls reading function that can recognize the unz output (I would love to be proven wrong here). If it were a 'csv' it would work fine. As it stands, until such a function is written, you must do the loading in two steps extraction and then loading.
To give you a little more control, you can specify which file to unzip as well as the directory to place the files with unzip.
# default exdir is current directory
unzip(zipfile="./Data/Project1.zip", files = "schools.xls", exdir=".")
dataframe_1 <- read.xls("schools.xls")
Sadly, this also means that you must do cleanup afterwards if you don't want the 'xls' file hanging around.

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