You can create your own class and pass that to read table. In the example below Fld2 is read in with factor levels C, A, B in that order.
library(methods) setClass("my.levels") setAs("character", "my.levels", function(from) factor(from, levels = c("C", "A", "B"))) ### test ### Input <- "Fld1 Fld2 10 A 20 B 30 C 40 A " DF <- read.table(textConnection(Input), header = TRUE, colClasses = c("numeric", "my.levels")) str(DF) # or DF <- read.table(textConnection(Input), header = TRUE, colClasses = list(Fld2 = "my.levels")) str(DF) On 8/28/07, Sébastien <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Dear R-users, > > I have found this not-so-recent post in the archives - > http://tolstoy.newcastle.edu.au/R/devel/00a/0291.html - while I was > looking for a particular way to reorder factor levels. The question > addressed by the author was to know if the read.table function could be > modified to order the levels of newly created factors "according to the > order that they appear in the data file". Exactly what I am looking for. > As there was no reply to this post, I wonder if any move have been made > towards the implementation of this suggestion. A quick look at > ?read.table tells me that if this option was implemented, it was not in > the read.table function... > > Sebastien > > PS: I am sorry to post so many messages on the list, but I am learning R > (basically by trials & errors ;-) ) and no one around me has even a > slight notion about it... > > ______________________________________________ > R-help@stat.math.ethz.ch mailing list > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help > PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html > and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. > ______________________________________________ R-help@stat.math.ethz.ch mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.