R Basics

Using R in the console

The most basic way to interact with R is to type code directly in the console

  • type expression to evaluate
  • hit return
  • output of the evaluation of the expression is printed to the console below

The simplest thing you could do with R is do arithmetic.

1 + 100
[1] 101

If you type in an incomplete command, R will wait for you to complete it:

1 +
+

Any time you hit return and the R session shows a + instead of a >, it means it’s waiting for you to complete the command. If you want to cancel a command you can hit Esc and the console will return to the > prompt.

Working in scripts

To make code and workflows reproducible and easy to re-run, it’s better to save code in a script and use the script editor to edit it. This way, there is a complete record of your analysis.

Creating a new script

Click on File > New File > R Script. Click on the save icon or (like any other file) using keyboard shortcut CTRL / CMD + S

Executing commands from scripts

RStudio allows you to execute commands directly from the script editor by using the Ctrl + Enter shortcut (on Macs, Cmd + Return will work, too).

When you execute commands from a script, the line of code in the script indicated by the cursor or any commands currently highlighted will be sent to the console. You can find other keyboard shortcuts in Tools > Keyboard Shortcuts Help or in the RStudio IDE cheatsheet.

Comments

You can add comments to your code by using a hash symbol #. Any text on a line of code following # is ignored by R when it executes code.

1 + 10 # this text does nothing
[1] 11

Using R as a calculator

When using R as a calculator, the order of operations is the same as you would have learned back in school.

From highest to lowest precedence:

  • Parentheses: (, )
  • Exponents: ^ or **
  • Multiply: *
  • Divide: /
  • Add: +
  • Subtract: - 
3 + 5 * 2
[1] 13

Use parentheses to group operations in order to force the order of evaluation if it differs from the default, or to make clear what you intend.

(3 + 5) * 2
[1] 16

Really small or large numbers get a scientific notation:

2/10000
[1] 2e-04

Which is shorthand for “multiplied by 10^XX”. So 2e-4 is shorthand for 2 * 10^(-4).

You can write numbers in scientific notation too:

5e3  # Note the lack of minus here
[1] 5000

Mathematical functions

R has many built in mathematical functions. To call a function, we can type its name, followed by open and closing parentheses. Anything we type inside the parentheses is called the function’s arguments:

sin(1)  # trigonometry functions
[1] 0.841471
log(1)  # natural logarithm
[1] 0
log10(10) # base-10 logarithm
[1] 1
exp(0.5) # e^(1/2)
[1] 1.648721
Tip

Don’t worry about trying to remember every function in R. You can look them up on Google, or if you can remember the start of the function’s name, you can take advantage of the tab completion in RStudio.

This is one advantage that RStudio has over R on its own, it has auto-completion abilities that allow you to more easily look up functions, their arguments, and the values that they take.

Typing a ? before the name of a function will open the help page for that function. As well as providing a detailed description of the function and how it works, scrolling to the bottom of the help page will usually show a collection of code examples which illustrate how to use it. We’ll go through an example later.

Variables and assignment

We can store values in variables using the assignment operator <-, like this:

x <- 1/40

Notice that assignment does not print a value. Instead, we stored the value in something called a variable. x now contains the value 0.025. We can examine the value contained in any variable by printing it’s contents to the console:

x
[1] 0.025

If we look at the Environment tab, we will see that variable x now exists in the environment and can also preview its value. Our variable x can be used in place of its value in any calculation that expects a number:

log(x)
[1] -3.688879

Notice also that variables can be reassigned:

x <- 100
x
[1] 100

x used to contain the value 0.025 and now it has the value 100.

Expressions to create re-assigned variables can contain the initial value of the variable being assigned to:

x <- x + 1 #notice how RStudio updates its description of x on the top right tab
y <- x * 2
  • The right hand side of the assignment can be any valid R expression.
  • The right hand side is fully evaluated before the assignment occurs.

On variable names

Variable names can contain letters, numbers, underscores and periods. They cannot start with a number nor contain spaces at all.

Different people use different conventions for long variable names, these include

  • periods.between.words
  • camelCaseToSeparateWords
  • snake_case: underscores_between_words

While I suggest you use snake_case, ultimately what you use is up to you, but be consistent.

Even more important is that variable names are descriptive enough of what they contain. So long and descriptive is better than shorter and cryptic.

Comparing things

We can also do comparison in R. These return TRUE or FALSE.

x <- 1
x < 2  # less than
[1] TRUE
x <= 1  # less than or equal to
[1] TRUE
x > 0  # greater than
[1] TRUE
x >= -9 # greater than or equal to
[1] TRUE
x <- "apple"
x == "apple"  # equality (note two equals signs, read as "is equal to")
[1] TRUE
x == "orange"
[1] FALSE
x != "orange"  # inequality (read as "is not equal to")
[1] TRUE
x %in% c("apple", "orange") # membership (read as "is member of")
[1] TRUE
Caution

A word of warning about comparing numbers: you should avoid using == to compare two numbers unless they are integers (a data type which can specifically represent only whole numbers).

This is because of the way that R stores floating point numbers (i.e. of data type "double").

To compare floating point numbers safely, you should use the all.equal function, which is designed to compare floating point numbers within a certain tolerance. _

x <- 1.02
all.equal(x, 1.02)
[1] TRUE

Combining comparisons with & and |

We can combine comparisons using the & and | operators:

& (AND)

& is effectively translated as “and”. When using & ALL conditions must be met for the whole statement to evaluate to TRUE.

x <- 4
x > 5 & x < 10  
[1] FALSE

In this case, because we are using the & operator, the result in FALSE because, although x is less than 10, it is not greater than 5. Both conditions must be met for the whole statement to evaluate to TRUE.

| (OR)

| is translated as “or” and only a single condition needs to be met for the whole statement to evaluate to TRUE.

x > 5 | x < 10 
[1] TRUE

This time, because we are using the | operator, the condition is met if either x > 5 or x < 10 is true. In our case, although x is not greater than 5, it is less than 10, so the statement to evaluates to TRUE.

Base R Cheatsheet

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