Which method of subsetting is the best practice?

Question

These two produce the same outcome, but is there an advantage of using one over the other.

Are they the same thing across all boards?
Is one inherently better than the other?
Do they have different applications and are good at different things?

mtcars[mtcars$mpg > 20, c("mpg", "cyl")]

subset(mtcars, mpg > 20, select=c("mpg", "cyl"))

Your second example would more commonly be written `subset(mtcars, mpg > 20, c(mpg, cyl))`. — Hong Ooi, Oct 18 '13 at 06:15

score 1 · Answer 1 · answered Oct 18 '13 at 05:51

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from the help for subset (?subset):

This is a convenience function intended for use interactively. For programming it is better to use the standard subsetting functions like [, and in particular the non-standard evaluation of argument subset can have unanticipated consequences.

answered Oct 18 '13 at 05:51

Adrian

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Yes, @ant. Please follow the lead of userX and read the help pages. – IRTFM Oct 18 '13 at 06:57

score 0 · Answer 2 · edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

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from ?subset

Warning

This is a convenience function intended for use interactively. For programming it is better to use the standard subsetting functions like [, and in particular the non-standard evaluation of argument subset can have unanticipated consequences.

edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

Community

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answered Oct 18 '13 at 05:51

Ricardo Saporta

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Which method of subsetting is the best practice?

2 Answers2