printing asterisks in R

[aspri951]

I am also stuck on question 9 (drawing a box). My (smaller) goal: write code that returns a line of asterisks with no quotation marks around them. Problem, as I understand it: R views "*" as an operator (multiplication), so it returns an error whenever it sees an asterisk in a context that is NOT "multiplying numbers." Making the asterisk into a character fixes this, but means my line is full of quotation marks:

star.line <- function(w){
  top.of.box <- rep("*", w)
  return(top.of.box)
}
#works, but has quotations around the asterisks

star.line <- function(w){
  top.of.box <- "*"
  return(rep(top.of.box, w))
}
#same result. Try using print?

star.line <- function(w){
  for(i in 1:w){
    print("*")
  }
}
#prints vertical row of asterisks in quotations

Question: What R function would allow me to print an asterisk (or where would I look to find such a function)? I've looked through all the terms I defined in Assignment 1 and considered matrix, table, the par function bty, but none seem to be useful. Maybe I'm missing something.

[willpearse]

Try the "cat" function. Note that "\n" will print a new line.

On Sat, Jan 21, 2017, 12:26 AM aspri951 notifications@github.com wrote:

I am also stuck on question 9 (drawing a box). My (smaller) goal: write code that returns a line of asterisks with no quotation marks around them. Problem, as I understand it: R views "*" as an operator (multiplication), so it returns an error whenever it sees an asterisk in a context that is NOT "multiplying numbers." Making the asterisk into a character fixes this, but means my line is full of quotation marks:

star.line <- function(w){ top.of.box <- rep("*", w) return(top.of.box) }

works, but has quotations around the asterisks

star.line <- function(w){ top.of.box <- "*" return(rep(top.of.box, w)) }

same result. Try using print?

star.line <- function(w){ for(i in 1:w){ print("*") } }

prints vertical row of asterisks in quotations

Question: What R function would allow me to print an asterisk (or where would I look to find such a function)? I've looked through all the terms I defined in Assignment 1 and considered matrix, table, the par function bty, but none seem to be useful. Maybe I'm missing something.

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[aspri951]

I made a box! Took an hour, but if I could finish every problem in only an hour life would be good indeed...

Question: How can I go about trying to find a function I've never seen before (other than you just telling me)? In the future I might need a function that's not in assignment #1, and as I mentioned, it's these basic syntax/language fluency problems that keep getting me stuck, not the programming itself. Once I had the "cat" function, writing a function to draw a box was simple! Clearly what I'm lacking is a) a good resource for fixing my basic language/syntax ignorance, and/or b) the skill to sort through resources like stack overflow without getting myself into even deeper trouble due to my aforementioned language ignorance.

... I'm guessing there's not a short or easy answer to this question. Sorry! Either way, hopefully it's useful to know where I'm continually getting stuck.

[willpearse]

Mostly via Google, to be quite honest with you... Otherwise searching by typing "??print" or ??"confusing thing" (notice my double quotes in the last example when searching for something with a space in it) at the console.

For what it's worth, it is possible to complete the exercise without cat, but I realise that's probably of little consolation :(

On Sun, Jan 22, 2017, 5:25 PM aspri951 notifications@github.com wrote:

I made a box! Took an hour, but if I could finish every problem in only an hour life would be good indeed...

Question: How can I go about trying to find a function I've never seen before (other than you just telling me)? In the future I might need a function that's not in assignment #1 https://github.com/pearselab/r-intro-aspri951/issues/1, and as I mentioned, it's these basic syntax/language fluency problems that keep getting me stuck, not the programming itself. Once I had the "cat" function, writing a function to draw a box was simple! Clearly what I'm lacking is a) a good resource for fixing my basic language/syntax ignorance, and/or b) the skill to sort through resources like stack overflow without getting myself into even deeper trouble due to my aforementioned language ignorance.

... I'm guessing there's not a short or easy answer to this question. Sorry! Either way, hopefully it's useful to know where I'm continually getting stuck.

— You are receiving this because you commented.

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