Newbie to the R world needing assistance with column creation

[Reece]

I just can not get my head around this issue I need to solve.
I need to create a column called"ride_length" which will contain the duration of rides. I need to subtract the "started_at" column from the "ended_at" column and have the results formatted in minutes. please find attached a screenshot of the graph and code that I have already implemented into R. I have tried the "mutate" function but I am not sure what else to add. Please help!

[jrkrideau]

You are more or less on the right track but it would be easier to answer your question if we had some data. A handy way to supply some sample data is the dput() function. In the case of a large dataset like yours something like dput(head(mydata, 100)) should supply the data we need. Just do dput(mydata) where mydata is your the name of your dataset . Copy the output and paste it here.

[Rolando]

Maybe if you try something like the following:

cyclyistic_q1$ride_length <- difftime(cyclyistic_q1$ended_at,cyclyistic_q1$started_at,units = 'mins')

I am afraid that is the best I can suggest without seeing your data as jkrideau has suggested.

I hope this helps

[Reece]

Will do, can you see the picture that I have uploaded. You will be able to see the data on it. Nevertheless i will input the function that you suggest, one moment

[jrkrideau]

I can see it but what you see is often not what you get. For example, the columns ended_at' and started_at` look like the are character variales but they could be actual date-time format and we would need to handle them very differently.

At a guess, if they are character then if we call your data dat1 one or both of these will work but it is much better to have real data,

# BASE R.
dat1$ride  <-  difftime(dat1$ended_at, dat1$started_at,  units = "mins")
# BASE R.
dat1$ride  <-  difftime(dat1$ended_at, dat1$started_at,  units = "mins")

# Tidyverse. 
mutate(dat1, ride = difftime(ended_at, started_at,  units = "mins")) 

My Base R code just another way of doing what @Rolando suggests.

[Reece]

This code was successful, thank you a tonne. I literally spent the whole day trying to solve this haha

[Rolando]

You are very welcome. It would be great if you could mark my suggestions as solved!

[Reece]

Done! thanks again
Hopefully I can get to a point were understanding R becomes second nature

[jrkrideau]

You will but it takes a while. It's a weird language. I tend to think of it as beginner hostile.