topic Re: Why does my date column in data frame change to a double in output from arc.write? in R-ArcGIS Questions

Why does my date column in data frame change to a double in output from arc.write?

SaraStrachan — Thu, 09 Nov 2017 22:14:14 GMT

I have a column in a data frame with date (2016-08-25). When I transfer the file to ArcGIS, the output column is converted to a double format and it looks like this (16847). How do I maintain the date format during the transfer?

Re: Why does my date column in data frame change to a double in output from arc.write?

ShaunWalbridge — Sat, 02 Dec 2017 05:39:11 GMT

Sara,

Could you provide a short example of what you're seeing? The output number you're showing does look like the VT_DATE object that is used internally in some formats for representing a date, but it shouldn't be displayed that way within ArcGIS.

Thanks,

Shaun

Re: Why does my date column in data frame change to a double in output from arc.write?

SaraStrachan — Mon, 04 Dec 2017 23:17:54 GMT

Here's the code I used and I've attached the input. The attached output was exported from the gdb.

----------------------------------------------

library(tidyverse)
library(lubridate)

ID_PM25_2017 <- read.csv("E:/D_drive/R_Projects/Monitors/ID_PM25_dailyAQI_070117to093017.csv",header = TRUE,sep=",", stringsAsFactors = FALSE)

ID_PM25_2017$xDate <- mdy(ID_PM25_2017$xDate)

library(arcgisbinding)
arc.check_product()

arc.write(path = ("E:/D_drive/Pro_Projects/BackgroundConcentrations/BackgroundConcentrations.gdb/ID_PM25_2017"), data = ID_PM25_2017)

-----------------------------------------

Re: Why does my date column in data frame change to a double in output from arc.write?

ShaunWalbridge — Wed, 20 Dec 2017 16:21:34 GMT

Sara,

Thank you for the reproducible example. It looks like lubridate converts its date objects into the Date class object, and the bridge isn't currently equipped to read these. For now, you can work around this by making this change on line 5 of your script:

ID_PM25_2017$xDate <- as.POSIXct(mdy(ID_PM25_2017$xDate))‍

I've posted an issue on GitHub to track this, and will update you once we've resolved the underlying issue.

Cheers,
Shaun