How to Use the seq() Function in R

The seq() function in R is “used to generate a regular sequence of numbers”.

Syntax

seq(from, to, by, length.out=NULL, along.with=NULL)

Parameters

  1. from: It represents where the sequence should begin.
  2. to: It represents where the sequence should end.
  3. by: It represents the step size or interval of the sequence.
  4. length.out: The desired length of the sequence.
  5. along.with: The desired length that matches the length of this data object.

Example 1: Generate a Sequence Starting from One

If you pass a single argument, it is considered an ending point, and the starting point is assumed as 1. So your sequence will be from 1 to the ending point.

s <- seq(5)
print(s)

Output

[1] 1 2 3 4 5

Example 2: Generating a sequence in R

s <- seq(0, 5)
print(s)

Output

[1] 0 1 2 3 4 5

Example 3: Generate Sequence with Custom Incrementing

vec <- seq(from = 0, to = 20, by = 4)

vec

Output

[1] 0 4 8 12 16 20

Example 4: Generate a Sequence with a Specific Length

data <- seq(from = 0, to = 20, length.out = 4)

# view sequence
data

Output

[1] 0.000000 6.666667 13.333333 20.000000

Example 5: Seq() function with argument “by”

The “by” parameter is an integer that indicates the increment of the sequence.

s <- seq(0, 10, by = 2)
print(s)

Output

[1] 0 2 4 6 8 10

Example 6: Seq() function with argument “length.out”

The “length.out” parameter is the desired length of the sequence.

s <- seq(1, 10, length.out = 11)
print(s)

Output

[1] 1.0 1.9 2.8 3.7 4.6 5.5 6.4 7.3 8.2 9.1 10.0

Example 7: Seq() function with argument “along”

for (x in list(NULL, letters[1:6], list(1, pi)))
    cat("x=", deparse(x), "; seq(along = x):", seq(along = x), "\n")

Output

x= NULL ; seq(along = x):
x= c("a", "b", "c", "d", "e", "f") ; seq(along = x): 1 2 3 4 5 6
x= list(1, 3.14159265358979) ; seq(along = x): 1 2

That’s it.

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