R: extract directory out of a path

Question

Possible Duplicate:
How do I extract a file/folder_name only from a path?

May I ask you how I can get the last subdirectory of a path. For example I want to get the subdirectory "7" and the following code fails:

Path <- "123\\456\\7"
Split <- strsplit(Path, "\\") # Fails because of 'Trailing backslash'
LastElement <- c[[1]][length(Split[[1]])]

Thank you in advance

score 28 · Accepted Answer · answered Jul 24 '12 at 22:15

28

You could also use the built-in function basename:

basename(Path)
[1] "7"

answered Jul 24 '12 at 22:15

James

2

Interesting that this currently has almost 2x the up-votes compared to the same answer in the previous question (7 vs 4)... – Joshua Ulrich Dec 18 '12 at 21:17

score 5 · Answer 2 · edited Jul 24 '12 at 21:52

5

You have to add a second pair of \\ to escape the \ to the regex:

> Path <- "123\\456\\7"
> Split <- strsplit(Path, "\\\\")
> Split[[1]][length(Split[[1]])]
[1] "7"

edited Jul 24 '12 at 21:52

thelatemail

answered Jul 24 '12 at 21:42

melopsitaco

2 Answers2