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rstringvectortype-conversionopennlp

R. Converting a vector of type character, into a string

I am having some trouble converting a vector type object into a string.

I have tried : 

x <- paste(x, sep = " ", collapse = NULL)

and various different types of paste function but the return of is.String(x) is still FALSE and the return for is.vector is still TRUE. Here's my code below:

bio_sentences <- sent_detect(bio) #Using openNLP to get the sentences from a bio
is.vector(bio_sentences) #Returns TRUE
sentisimo <- bio_sentences[1] #Needed as I want to do analysis sentence by sentence
sentisimo <- paste(sentisimo, sep = " ", collapse = NULL)
as.character(sentisimo) 
is.vector(sentisimo) #Returns TRUE
is.character(sentisimo) #Returns TRUE
sentisimo <- paste(bio_sentences[1], sep = "")
as.String(sentisimo)
is.String(sentisimo) #Returns FALSE
str(sentisimo) Returns chr "1st sentence of the bio"
dput(sentisimo) #Returns "Dennis Muilenburg is chairman of the board, president and chief executive officer of The Boeing Company."

If anyone could help me convert the elements of a vector into a string I'd appreciate it.

Solution

  • a string (as defined in the sense of the NLP package) is not the same as a base-R character.

    library(NLP)
xchar <- "abc"
xstring <- as.String("abc")

> xchar
[1] "abc"
> xstring
abc

    From this you can already see one of the differences of NLP stings and base R characters, namely the printing properties. Also:

    > is.character(xstring)
[1] TRUE
> is.String(xstring)
[1] TRUE
> is.character(xchar)
[1] TRUE
> is.String(xchar)
[1] FALSE

    So if you want a String object you should use as.String instead of as.character