How to read data when some numbers contain commas as thousand separator?

Question

I have a csv file where some of the numerical values are expressed as strings with commas as thousand separator, e.g. \"1,513\" instead of 1513. Wh

Answer 1

a dplyr solution using mutate_all and pipes

say you have the following:

> dft
Source: local data frame [11 x 5]

   Bureau.Name Account.Code   X2014   X2015   X2016
1       Senate          110 158,000 211,000 186,000
2       Senate          115       0       0       0
3       Senate          123  15,000  71,000  21,000
4       Senate          126   6,000  14,000   8,000
5       Senate          127 110,000 234,000 134,000
6       Senate          128 120,000 159,000 134,000
7       Senate          129       0       0       0
8       Senate          130 368,000 465,000 441,000
9       Senate          132       0       0       0
10      Senate          140       0       0       0
11      Senate          140       0       0       0

and want to remove commas from the year variables X2014-X2016, and convert them to numeric. also, let's say X2014-X2016 are read in as factors (default)

dft %>%
    mutate_all(funs(as.character(.)), X2014:X2016) %>%
    mutate_all(funs(gsub(",", "", .)), X2014:X2016) %>%
    mutate_all(funs(as.numeric(.)), X2014:X2016)

mutate_all applies the function(s) inside funs to the specified columns

I did it sequentially, one function at a time (if you use multiple functions inside funs then you create additional, unnecessary columns)