R Language Lists Serialization: using lists to pass informations
Example
There exist cases in which it is necessary to put data of different types together. In Azure ML for example, it is necessary to pass informations from a R script module to another one exclusively throught dataframes. Suppose we have a dataframe and a number:
> df
name height team fun_index title age desc Y
1 Andrea 195 Lazio 97 6 33 eccellente 1
2 Paja 165 Fiorentina 87 6 31 deciso 1
3 Roro 190 Lazio 65 6 28 strano 0
4 Gioele 70 Lazio 100 0 2 simpatico 1
5 Cacio 170 Juventus 81 3 33 duro 0
6 Edola 171 Lazio 72 5 32 svampito 1
7 Salami 175 Inter 75 3 30 doppiopasso 1
8 Braugo 180 Inter 79 5 32 gjn 0
9 Benna 158 Juventus 80 6 28 esaurito 0
10 Riggio 182 Lazio 92 5 31 certezza 1
11 Giordano 185 Roma 79 5 29 buono 1
> number <- "42"
We can access to this information:
> paste(df$name[4],"is a",df3$team[4], "supporter." )
[1] "Gioele is a Lazio supporter."
> paste("The answer to THE question is", number )
[1] "The answer to THE question is 42"
In order to put different types of data in a dataframe we have to use the list object and the serialization. In particular we have to put the data in a generic list and then put the list in a particular dataframe:
l <- list(df,number)
dataframe_container <- data.frame(out2 = as.integer(serialize(l, connection=NULL)))
Once we have stored the information in the dataframe, we need to deserialize it in order to use it:
#----- unserialize ----------------------------------------+
unser_obj <- unserialize(as.raw(dataframe_container$out2))
#----- taking back the elements----------------------------+
df_mod <- unser_obj[1][[1]]
number_mod <- unser_obj[2][[1]]
Then, we can verify that the data are transfered correctly:
> paste(df_mod$name[4],"is a",df_mod$team[4], "supporter." )
[1] "Gioele is a Lazio supporter."
> paste("The answer to THE question is", number_mod )
[1] "The answer to THE question is 42"
