pivot_longer with multiple classes causes error (“No common type”)

Question

I am running pivot_longer on multiple columns (i.e. two character columns and one numeric). I am encountering an error related to the class mismatch.

I

Answer 1

The error is now there again in a different guise when the values_ptypes argument is used.

library(tidyverse)

small_diamonds <- diamonds %>% 
  select(cut, color, price) %>% 
  mutate(row_num = row_number())

small_diamonds %>%  
  pivot_longer( - row_num, 
                names_to = "key",
                values_to = "val", 
                values_ptypes = list(val = 'character'))
#> Error: Can't convert  to .

Therefore I need to use the values_transform argument to get the desired result.

library(tidyverse)

  small_diamonds <- diamonds %>% 
    select(cut, color, price) %>% 
    mutate(row_num = row_number())
  
  small_diamonds %>%  
    pivot_longer( - row_num, 
                  names_to = "key",
                  values_to = "val", 
                  values_transform = list(val = as.character))
#> # A tibble: 161,820 x 3
#>    row_num key   val    
#>          
#>  1       1 cut   Ideal  
#>  2       1 color E      
#>  3       1 price 326    
#>  4       2 cut   Premium
#>  5       2 color E      
#>  6       2 price 326    
#>  7       3 cut   Good   
#>  8       3 color E      
#>  9       3 price 327    
#> 10       4 cut   Premium
#> # ... with 161,810 more rows

^{Created on 2020-08-25 by the reprex package (v0.3.0)}