gdata (version 2.6.0)

read.xls: Read Excel files

Description

Reads a Microsoft Excel file into a data frame

Usage

read.xls(xls, sheet=1, verbose=FALSE, pattern, ...,
         method=c("csv","tab"), perl="perl")
xls2csv(xls, sheet=1, verbose=FALSE, ..., perl="perl")
xls2tab(xls, sheet=1, verbose=FALSE, ..., perl="perl")
xls2sep(xls, sheet=1, verbose=FALSE, ..., method=c("csv","tab"),
        perl="perl")

Arguments

xls

path to the Microsoft Excel file. To access a file on the internet, start the path with "http://".

sheet

number of the sheet within the Excel file from which data are to be read

verbose

logical flag indicating whether details should be printed as the file is processed.

pattern

if specified, them skip all lines before the first containing this string

perl

name of the perl executable to be called.

method

intermediate file format, "csv" for comma-separated and "tab" for tab-separated

...

additional arguments to read.table. The defaults of read.csv are used.

Value

• "read.xls" returns a data frame.

  "xls2sep" returns a temporary file in the specified format. "xls2csv" and "xls2tab" are simply wrappers for "xls2sep" specifying method as "csv" or "tab", respectively.

Details

This function works translating the named Microsoft Excel file into a temporary .csv or .tab file, using the xls2csv or xls2tab Perl script installed as part of this (gdata) package.

Caution: In the conversion to csv, strings will be quoted. This can be problem if you are trying to use the comment.char option of read.table since the first character of all lines (including comment lines) will be """ after conversion.

Caution: If you call "xls2csv" directly, is your responsibility to close and delete the file after using it.

References

http://www.analytics.washington.edu/statcomp/downloads/xls2csv

See Also

read.csv

Examples

# iris.xls is included in the gregmisc package for use as an example
   xlsfile <- file.path(.path.package('gdata'),'xls','iris.xls')
   xlsfile

   iris <- read.xls(xlsfile) # defaults to csv format
   iris <- read.xls(xlsfile,method="csv") # specify csv format
   iris <- read.xls(xlsfile,method="tab") # specify tab format

   head(iris)  # look at the top few rows

   iris.1 <- read.xls(xlsfile) # defaults to csv format
   iris.2 <- read.xls(xlsfile,method="csv") # specify csv format
   iris.3 <- read.xls(xlsfile,method="tab") # specify tab format

   stopifnot(all.equal(iris.1, iris.2))
   stopifnot(all.equal(iris.1, iris.3))


  # Example specifying exact Perl path for default MS-Windows install of
   # ActiveState perl
   iris <- read.xls(xlsfile, perl="C:/perl/bin/perl.exe")

   # Example specifying exact Perl path for Unix systems
   iris <- read.xls(xlsfile, perl="/usr/bin/perl")

   # read xls file from net
   nba.url <- "http://lcb1.uoregon.edu/sergiok/DSC330HSP04/week5/NBA.xls"
   nba <- read.xls(nba.url)

   # read xls file ignoring all lines prior to first containing State
   crime.url <- "http://www.jrsainfo.org/jabg/state_data2/Tribal_Data00.xls"
   crime <- read.xls(crime.url, pattern = "State")

   # use of xls2csv - open con, print two lines, close con
   con <- xls2csv(nba.url)
   print(readLines(con, 2)) 
   file.remove(summary(con)$description)