strsplit in R Programming - Practice Problems & Coding Challenges

Challenge - 5 Problems

❓ Predict Output

intermediate

Output of strsplit with multiple delimiters

What is the output of the following R code?

R Programming

text <- "apple,banana;cherry orange"
result <- strsplit(text, split = ",|;| ")
print(result)

A

[[1]]
[1] "apple" "banana" "cherry orange"

B

[[1]]
[1] "apple,banana;cherry orange"

C

[[1]]
[1] "apple" "banana;cherry" "orange"

D

[[1]]
[1] "apple" "banana" "cherry" "orange"

💡 Hint

The split argument can use regular expressions to split by multiple characters.

The split pattern ",|;| " means split at commas, semicolons, or spaces. So the string is split into four parts: apple, banana, cherry, and orange.

❓ Predict Output

intermediate

Result of strsplit with fixed = TRUE

What is the output of this R code?

R Programming

text <- "one.two.three"
result <- strsplit(text, split = ".", fixed = TRUE)
print(result)

A

[[1]]
[1] "one" "two" "three"

B

[[1]]
[1] "one.two.three"

C

[[1]]
[1] "one" "two.three"

D

[[1]]
[1] "one.two" "three"

💡 Hint

fixed = TRUE treats the split string literally, not as a regular expression.

With fixed = TRUE, the dot is treated as a normal character, so the string splits at each dot into three parts.

🔧 Debug

advanced

Identify the error in strsplit usage

What error does this R code produce?

R Programming

text <- "a,b,c"
result <- strsplit(text, split = c(",", ";"))
print(result)

A Error in strsplit: unused argument (split = c(",", ";"))

B Error in strsplit: 'split' must be a single string

C

[[1]]
[1] "a" "b" "c"

D NULL

💡 Hint

The split argument must be a single string, not a vector.

strsplit expects a single string pattern for splitting. Passing a vector causes an error about 'split' needing to be a single string.

🧠 Conceptual

advanced

Understanding strsplit output structure

What is the type and structure of the value returned by strsplit in R?

A A list where each element is a character vector of split parts

B A character vector of split parts

C A data frame with columns for each split part

D A matrix of characters with rows as split parts

💡 Hint

strsplit always returns a list, even if input is a single string.

strsplit returns a list. Each element corresponds to an input string and contains a character vector of the split parts.

❓ Predict Output

expert

Count of elements after splitting multiple strings

What is the length of the vector inside the first element of the list returned by this code?

R Programming

texts <- c("red,green,blue", "circle,square")
result <- strsplit(texts, split = ",")
length(result[[1]])

A 1

B 2

C 3

D Error: subscript out of bounds

💡 Hint

The first element corresponds to splitting the first string.

The first string "red,green,blue" splits into three parts, so length(result[[1]]) is 3.