3.6 Operators

20210103 The third type of function is the operator. We use operators in the flow of an expression. Technically they are called infix operators.

In the following example we use the base::+ infix operator.

# Add two numbers using an infix operator.

1 + 2
## [1] 3

Internally R actually converts the operator into a functional prefix form to be run in the same way as any other function.

# Add two numbers using the equivalent functional form.

+(1, 2)
## [1] 3

Note that R also supports using quotes and double quotes instead of the backtick we used in the code above. The backtick is preferred as per page 142 of .

The key thing to remember is that all commands and operators are functions and we instruct R to take action by running functions.

References

Wickham, Hadley. 2014. Advanced R. Chapman & Hall/CRC the r Series. Chapman & Hall.

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