system                 package:base                 R Documentation

_I_n_v_o_k_e _a _S_y_s_t_e_m _C_o_m_m_a_n_d

_D_e_s_c_r_i_p_t_i_o_n:

     `system' invokes the system command specified by `command'.

_U_s_a_g_e:

     system(command, intern = FALSE, ignore.stderr = FALSE)

_A_r_g_u_m_e_n_t_s:

 command: the system command to be invoked, as a string.

  intern: a logical, indicates whether to make the output of the
          command an R object.

ignore.stderr: a logical indicating whether error messages (written to
          `stderr') should be ignored.  This probably only affects
          Unix-like systems and is ignored otherwise.

_D_e_t_a_i_l_s:

     If `intern' is `TRUE' then `popen' is used to invoke the command
     and the output collected, line by line, into an R `character'
     vector which is returned as the value of `system'.  If `intern' is
     `FALSE' then the C function `system' is used to invoke the command
     and the value returned by `system' is the exit status of this
     function.  This function provides users with the ability to invoke
     system commands on whatever platform they are using.

     `unix' is a deprecated alternative, available for backwards
     compatibility.

_S_e_e _A_l_s_o:

     `.Platform' for platform specific variables.

_E_x_a_m_p_l_e_s:

     # list all files in the current directory using the -F flag
     system("ls -F")

     # t1 contains a vector of strings, each one
     # representing a separate line of output from who
     t1 <- system("who", TRUE)

     system("ls fizzlipuzzli",TRUE,TRUE)# empty since file doesn't exist

