If efficiency is a concern, an "add.row.names=TRUE" option could be
added; users who didn't want the overhead would set this to FALSE.
Duncan Murdoch
On Fri, 9 Jul 2004 10:35:42 +0200, Martin Maechler
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote :
>>>>>> "PatBurns" == Patrick Burns <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>>>>>> on Tue, 27 Jan 2004 14:20:30 +0000 writes:
>
>[more than half a year ago]
>
> PatBurns> Duncan Murdoch wrote:
>
> .............
>
> DM> One other one I'll look at:
> DM>
> DM> If a matrix doesn't have row names, I might add names
> DM> like '[nn,]' to it, so I get results like
>
> R> x <- matrix(1:100,ncol=2)
> R> tail(x)
> Rout> [,1] [,2]
> Rout> [45,] 45 95
> Rout> [46,] 46 96
> Rout> [47,] 47 97
> Rout> [48,] 48 98
> Rout> [49,] 49 99
> Rout> [50,] 50 100
> Rout>
> DM> instead of the current
>
> R> tail(x)
> Rout> [,1] [,2]
> Rout> [1,] 45 95
> Rout> [2,] 46 96
> Rout> [3,] 47 97
> Rout> [4,] 48 98
> Rout> [5,] 49 99
> Rout> [6,] 50 100
>
> DM> I just want to be careful that this doesn't mess up
> DM> something else.
> DM>
> DM> Duncan Murdoch
>
>
> PatBurns> I think this could be being too "helpful". Using
> PatBurns> tail on a matrix may often be done in a program so
> PatBurns> I think leaving things as they come is the best
> PatBurns> policy.
>
>I tend to disagree, and would like to have us think about it
>again:
>
>1) Duncan's proposal was to only add row names *when* there are none.
>2) Pat is write that tail() for matrices maybe used not only interactively
> and help(tail)'s "Value:" section encourages this to some extent.
>
> However, how can adding column names to such a matrix-tail be harmful?
>
> Well, only in the case where the tail is quite large, the
> added dimnames add unneeded memory and other overhead when
> dealing with that matrix.
>
> But I think, programmers/users caring about efficient code
> wouldn't use tail(<matrix>) in their function code, would they?
>
>In conclusion, I'd still argue for following Duncan's proposal,
>maybe adding a \note{.} to head.Rd stating that these functions
>were meant for interactive use, and for "programming", we'd
>rather recommend the direct (n-k+1):n indexing.
>
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