Convert values to numeric handling multiple decimal separators

Attempts to convert values to numeric. If the input is already numeric, returns it as-is. Character strings are parsed with support for:

• Dot-decimal ("10.5") and comma-decimal ("10,5") notation

• Scientific notation ("1e-5", "2.5E+10")

• Thousand separators when both dot and comma are present ("1.234,56" European or "1,234.56" US)

Usage

safe_to_numeric(val)

Arguments

val

A numeric, character, or other vector to convert to numeric.

Value

Numeric vector of the same length, with NA for values that cannot be parsed.

Details

The function is vectorized: when given a character vector, each element is parsed independently.

Examples

safe_to_numeric(10.5)
#> [1] 10.5
safe_to_numeric("10.5")
#> [1] 10.5
safe_to_numeric("10,5")
#> [1] 10.5
safe_to_numeric("-3.14")
#> [1] -3.14
safe_to_numeric("1e-5")
#> [1] 1e-05
safe_to_numeric("1.234,56")
#> [1] 1234.56
safe_to_numeric(c("10.5", "10,5", "text", "1e-3"))
#> [1] 10.500 10.500     NA  0.001