Import Data, Copy Data from Excel to R, Both .csv and .txt Formats (R Tutorial 1.3)

Learn how to import or copy data from excel (or other spreadsheets) into R using both comma-separated values and tab-delimited text file. You will learn to use "read.csv", "read.delim" and "read.table" commands along with "file.choose", "header", and "sep" arguments.
This video is a tutorial for programming in R Statistical Software for beginners.

You can access the dataset here:
our website: http://www.statslectures.com/index.php/r-stats-videos-tutorials/getting-started-with-r/1-3-import-excel-data

or here:

Excel Data Used in This Video: http://bit.ly/1uyxR3O

Excel Data Used in Subsequent Videos: https://bit.ly/LungCapDataxls
Tab Delimited Text File Used in Subsequent Videos: https://bit.ly/LungCapData


Here is a quick overview of the topics addressed in this video; You can click on the time stamp to jump to the specific topic:

0:00:17 introducing the two main file types for saving a data file

0:00:36 how to save a file in excel as a csv file ("comma-separated value")

0:01:10 how to open a comma-separated (.csv) data file into excel

0:01:20 how to open a comma-separated (.csv) data file into a text editor

0:01:36 how to import comma-separated (.csv) data file into R using "read.csv" command

0:01:44 how to access the help menu for different commands in R

0:02:04 how to use "file.choose" argument on "read.csv" command to specify the file location in R

0:02:31 how to use the "header" argument on "read.csv" command to let R know that data has headers or variable names

0:03:22 how to import comma-separated (.csv) data file into R using "read.table" command

0:03:38 how to use "file.choose" argument on "read.table" command to specify the file location in R

0:03:41 how to use the "header" argument on "read.table" command to let R know the data has headers or variable names

0:03:46 how to use the "sep" argument on "read.table" command to let R know how the data values are separated

0:04:10 how to save a file in excel as tab-delimited text file

0:04:50 how to open a tab-delimited (.txt) data file into a text editor

0:05:07 how to open a tab-delimited (.txt) data file into excel

0:05:20 how to import tab-delimited (.txt) data file into R using "read.delim" command

0:05:44 how to use "file.choose" argument on "read.delim" command to specify the file path in R

0:05:49 how to use the "header" argument on "read.delim" command to let R know that the data has headers or variable

0:06:06 how to import tab-delimited (.txt) data file into R using "read.table" command

0:06:20 how to use "file.choose" argument on "read.table" command to specify the file location

0:06:23 how to use the "header" argument on "read.table" command to let R know that the data has headers or variable names

0:06:27 how to use the "sep" argument on "read.table" command to let R know how the data values are separated

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Closed Caption:

Hi! I am Mike Marin and in this video
we'll talk about
how to import data from Excel into R.
the steps outlined in this video
should work with most other spreadsheet
applications
but since Excel is fairly commonly used
we will focus our discussion on this
Our two main options will be to save the
data file
as a comma-separated value or ".csv"
file or as a tab-delimited text file
with the ".txt" extension. Saving it as a
csv file
is probably easier and the better way to
go! let's go ahead and save this file
on the desktop as a csv file: to do so
under the "File menu" we can go to "Save As..."
we're going to save it on our desktop
and we can save this as a
"comma-separated" value
or csv file. I'm also gonna add the
CSV to the end of the file name just so
it's easily identifiable
we can see
the ExceldataCSV file saved here on
the desktop
you'll notice if we double click on this
file to open it
by default it will open in Excel
let's go ahead and close this. You'll notice if
we right click
on this file we can "Open With..." and open
it in any text editor that we like
this here is what the csv file looks
like
in a text editor. okay so let's go ahead
and import this data into R. so I've gone
ahead and
opened up RStudio and R. the first
option for importing data
is to use the "read.csv" command. you can
access the Help menu
by typing help and in brackets the name
of the command you will like help for
or by placing a question mark (?) in front of the
command name;
let's go ahead and import this data into R
and save it in an object called "data1".
To do so
we will use the "read.csv" command. the first
argument to specify
is the "file". normally R would like us
to specify
the path to find the file here but a
handy command to know
in R is the "file.choose" command.
rather than specifying the path to find this file
we can use the "file.choose" command and
this will result in a menu popping up
allowing us to select the data file
directly. the next argument that we
should worry about
is the "header" argument. we can set this
equal to TRUE
using capital letters to let R know that
the first row of our dataset
are variable names or headers. if the
first row does not contain variable
names we would set the sequel to FALSE
it's also worth noting that we only need
to provide a capital T
and R will know this is TRUE. we can
then submit this command
by hitting the "enter" or "return" key on our
keyboard. we can now go and find this
file that we saved on the desktop : our "ExceldataCSV.CSV"
select this file and now
if we type in the object's name "data1"
we can see the entire dataset return to us.
it looks like R has imported this dataset correctly
we can also see in the workspace this
object data1
which has 10 observations on 6
variables
we can also import this data using the
more generic
"read.table" command. lets demonstrate
the use of this command
and import the data into R and save it
in an object called "data2"
here we will use the "read.table" command
again we will use the "file.choose" command
we will set the "header" argument
equal to TRUE
and here we also need to use the "sep"
argument
letting R know how the data values are
separated
in quotations we will place a comma letting
R know these are comma separated values
we can then submit this command, go on our
desktop
select the "ExceldataCSV.CSV" file
and when we type in the name of this
object
again we can see the data has been
imported correctly.
now let's go back to our excel file
and look at importing data saved as a
tab-delimited text file
once again you can see our Excel data file
we can go ahead and save this file as a
tab-delimited text file
here I will select the tab-delimited file with a .txt
extension and we will also
add the word TAB to the end of this file name, so
we can be easily identify this is the
tab-delimited file. we can then save it
and now we can see this tab-delimited
text file saved on the desktop here
you'll notice if you double-click on this
file to open it
by default it will be opened in a text
editor
you can also notice these values are
separated by tabs
let's go ahead and close this down. to
open this file
using Excel we can right click
"open with" and select Microsoft Excel
and now we'll see our tab-delimited text
file opened up in Excel
now let's go back into RSstudio and
import this data file
we can use the "read.delim" command in R
to import a tab-delimited text file
let's go ahead and import this dataset
using the "read.delim" command
and we will save the data into an object
called data3
we will use the "read.delim" command
as before we use the "file.choose" command
so that we can select our file from menu
we can set the "header" argument equal to
TRUE once we enter this command:
we can go onto the desktop open up our
tab-delimited
text file. again if we enter the object
name
we can see the data has been imported
correctly
and finally as we saw before we could
also use the more generic
"read.table" command. let's demonstrate
this and save the
data in an object called data4
we'll use the "read.table" command. again
"file.choose" so that we can select our
file
"header" equal to TRUE and finally we
can set
the "sep" argument equal to back-slash t (\t)
letting R know this is a tab-delimited file
we can go ahead and select the file
we can enter the dataset's name to view it
and again the data looks as it should. the
next video in the series
talks a bit more about importing data
and then how to get started working with
the data in R
once you've imported it. thanks for
watching this video
and make sure to check out my other
instructional videos