Loading variable into object from an RData file, is it memory-effecient?

Question

Here is an example:

MyClass = setRefClass("MyClass", fields = c("x", "y"))
MyClass$methods(
    initialize = function(xinit=0, yinit=0, filename="") {
        if(file.exists(filename)) {
            message("yes, it is there!")
            load(filename)
            print(x)
            print(y)
            x <<- x
            y <<- y
        } else {
            x <<- xinit
            y <<- yinit
        }
    }
)

x = 15
y = 20
save(x, y, file="/tmp/xydata")
## z = MyClass(x, y)
z = MyClass(filename="/tmp/xydata")
z$x
z$y

In the initialize function, are the values of x and y copied? If their size is large, would it be a problem? Is there a better way to load variables from a file?

Answer 1

The load() command allows you to specify which environment to load the data into. If you want to load into the global environment, just do that directly with

load(filename, envir=globalenv())