Safely Rename Columns in a Dataframe

Replaces specified column names with user-defined vector of new column name(s). This operation is done "safely" because it specifically matches each 'bad' name with its corresponding 'good' name and thus minimizes the risk of accidentally replacing the wrong column name.

Usage

safe_rename(data = NULL, bad_names = NULL, good_names = NULL)

Arguments

data

(dataframe or dataframe-like) object with column names that match the values passed to the bad_names argument

bad_names

(character) vector of column names to replace in original data object. Order does not need to match data column order but must match the good_names vector order

good_names

(character) vector of column names to use as replacements for data object. Order does not need to match data column order but must match the good_names vector order

Value

(dataframe or dataframe-like) with renamed columns

Examples

# Make a dataframe to demonstrate
df <- data.frame("first" = 1:3, "middle" = 4:6, "second" = 7:9)

# Invoke the function
safe_rename(data = df, bad_names = c("second", "middle"),
            good_names = c("third", "second"))
#>   first second third
#> 1     1      4     7
#> 2     2      5     8
#> 3     3      6     9