Apply subset to list of dataframes in R

Question

I have a 9 dataframes with the same column names and from each I need to remove all the rows that have a "+" in the column named "Reverse".

for a single dataframe I would do it this way:

df1 <- subset(df1, Reverse !=  "+")

is there a way to do this with all 9 at the same time?

I tried to put them all in a list first and then just use the same code as above but it doesnt work:

df.list <- list(df1, df2, df3, .....)
df.list <- subset(df.list, Reverse !=  "+")

Can someone help me?

Answer 1

You're close, use lapply to iterate a function on each frame:

df.list <- lapply(df.list, function(dat) subset(dat, Reverse != "+"))

FYI, especially considering they are all the same basic structure (names, etc), then keeping them in a list makes a lot of sense and I encourage you to stick with df.list instead of individual df1, df2, etc.