One thing to watch out for using POSIXct is 1us is about the limit of accuracy due to floating point (see FAQ 7.31). Notice that printing out today's date requires about 15 digits with microsecond granularity. Notice in the example that if the time difference between intervals is 0.1 us, you have exceeded the limit of precision with POSIXct.
If you need subsecond granularity, then maybe you want to break your timing up into a variable with 'days' and then another with time within a day, or create a different base for POSIXct: > x <- as.POSIXct("2011-05-01 17:55:23.123456") > x [1] "2011-05-01 17:55:23 EDT" > xc <- as.numeric(x) > print(xc, digits=20) [1] 1304286923.123456 > xc <- xc + seq(0, by = 0.000001, length = 20) > diff(xc) # about 1us granularity [1] 0.0000009536743 0.0000009536743 0.0000011920929 0.0000009536743 0.0000009536743 0.0000009536743 [7] 0.0000009536743 0.0000011920929 0.0000009536743 0.0000009536743 0.0000009536743 0.0000009536743 [13] 0.0000011920929 0.0000009536743 0.0000009536743 0.0000009536743 0.0000009536743 0.0000009536743 [19] 0.0000011920929 > xc <- as.numeric(x) > xc <- xc + seq(0, by = 0.0000001, length = 20) # by 0.1 us > diff(xc) # notice loss of precision [1] 0.0000000000000 0.0000002384186 0.0000000000000 0.0000002384186 0.0000000000000 0.0000002384186 [7] 0.0000000000000 0.0000000000000 0.0000002384186 0.0000000000000 0.0000002384186 0.0000000000000 [13] 0.0000000000000 0.0000002384186 0.0000000000000 0.0000002384186 0.0000000000000 0.0000002384186 [19] 0.0000000000000 > On Sun, May 1, 2011 at 2:52 PM, Rainer Stuetz <rainer.stu...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Sun, May 1, 2011 at 15:33, Joel Reymont <joe...@gmail.com> wrote: >> >> Does R have support for microseconds in timestamps, e.g. when reading this in >> >> "Time","Include","Kind","Duration" >> 2011-04-01 14:20:36.368324,Y,U,1.03238296509 >> 2011-04-01 14:20:35.342732,Y,C,0.0252721309662 >> 2011-04-01 14:20:34.337209,Y,R,0.00522899627686 >> > > See ?strptime: > > Specific to R is %OSn, which for output gives the seconds to 0 <= n <= 6 > decimal places (and if %OS is not followed by a digit, it uses the setting of > getOption("digits.secs"), or if that is unset, n = 3). Further, for strptime > %OS will input seconds including fractional seconds. Note that %S ignores > (and not rounds) fractional parts on output. > > > dat <- read.table(textConnection( > '"Time","Include","Kind","Duration" > 2011-04-01 14:20:36.368324,Y,U,1.03238296509 > 2011-04-01 14:20:35.342732,Y,C,0.0252721309662 > 2011-04-01 14:20:34.337209,Y,R,0.00522899627686'), > header=TRUE, sep=",") > > R> dat$Time <- as.POSIXct(dat$Time, "%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%OS6") > R> dat$Time > [1] "2011-04-01 14:20:36.368" "2011-04-01 14:20:35.343" > [3] "2011-04-01 14:20:34.337" > R> options(digits.secs=6) > R> dat$Time > [1] "2011-04-01 14:20:36.368324" "2011-04-01 14:20:35.342732" > [3] "2011-04-01 14:20:34.337209" > R> class(dat$Time) > [1] "POSIXct" "POSIXt" > > HTH, > Rainer > > ______________________________________________ > R-help@r-project.org mailing list > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help > PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html > and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code. > -- Jim Holtman Data Munger Guru What is the problem that you are trying to solve? ______________________________________________ R-help@r-project.org mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.