I have a list, and would like to break the elements of the list into seperate objects in the global environment.
For example, I would like the list:
obj <- list(a=1:5, b=2:10, c=-5:5) to be three seperate objects a, b, and c.
I tried to achieve this with:
lapply(obj, FUN = function(x) names(x)[1] <<- x[1]) But it failed, with Error in names(x)[1] <<- x[1] : object 'x' not found.
How might I achieve my aim?
There is special function for mapping list to environment:
> obj <- list(a=1:5, b=2:10, c=-5:5) > ls() [1] "obj" > list2env(obj,globalenv()) <environment: R_GlobalEnv> > ls() [1] "a" "b" "c" "obj" P. S. It is my comment provided as an answer
This also would work:
lapply(seq_along(obj), function(i) assign(names(obj)[i], obj[[i]], envir = .GlobalEnv)) 
obj[[i]] instead, so that you assign vectors, and not one element lists.
attach (which is a bad idea and why I don't recommend it). Then again if you don't like attaching data why are you doing what you want to do in the question instead of working directly with the list itself?In case the list isn't yet a named list, we need to set names first, e.g. with incrementing letters.
obj2 <- list(1:5, 2:10, -5:5) list2env(setNames(obj2, letters[seq(obj2)]), envir=.GlobalEnv) ls() # [1] "a" "b" "c" "obj2" I don't recommend it but you could use attach
> obj <- list(a=1:5, b=2:10, c=-5:5) > attach(obj) > a [1] 1 2 3 4 5 > b [1] 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 > c [1] -5 -4 -3 -2 -1 0 1 2 3 4 5 
obj to the search path. That doesn't mean you assign the elements of the list to independent objects in the global environment. Gregory has the correct answer.attach allows you to pretend like they're a part of the global environment (at least in simple cases) with very little work. With that said I definitely think Gregory's answer is the best out of the answers given.attach poses a lot more problems than it solves, not in the least when you try to change one of the elements in the list. As said in the R Style Guide : The possibilities for creating errors when using attach are numerous. Avoid it.