Statistical Analysis with R

The digital world we live in has given companies and people access to staggering amounts of data, and anyone who can make use of that to drive valuable insights stands to benefit. The ability to work with large amounts of data is becoming a standard requirement for countless jobs across multiple industries.

R, probably the most well-known language for data analysis, has been used for years due to its robust statistical functionality, outstanding graphing ability, and extensibility through packages.

This interactive module will get us up to speed with R and assumes no prior knowledge of it. We'll start with the very basics and work our way up to advanced concepts like exception handling. By the time we're done, we'll be able to write detailed, useful code in R.

Learn R from Scratch

# Difference between `print()` and `cat()`
Both `print()` and `cat()` can be used to display text on the screen. Let’s have a look at the code:


print()

cat()

The simple printing method in R is to use `print()`. As its name indicates, this method prints its arguments on the R console. 
However, `cat()` does the same thing but is valid only for atomic types (logical, integer, real, complex, character) and names, which will be covered in the later chapters. This means that we cannot call `cat()` on a **non-empty list** or any type of **object**. So, as its name implies, it converts arguments to characters and concatenates them.

An essential difference between `cat()` and `print()` is the **class** of the object they return. For now, you can assume that class means the type of object. This difference between the two methods can have practical consequences because there will be certain constraints as to what you can do with the **returned object**.

> `print()` displays its arguments to the console (or other output device) and invisibly returns its input. `cat()` concatenates and prints its arguments but does not return a value that can be assigned to any variable.

As you can see, `cat()` prints its arguments without quotes. In essence, `cat()` displays its content on the screen or in a file. 

## Concatenating Strings Using `cat()`
The actual usefulness of `cat()` can be obtained when we have two or more strings that we want to concatenate.

In this lesson, we provide details about the differences between print() and cat().

Getting Started

Variables

Exploring R Objects

R Operators and Notation

Conditional Statements

Loops

Functions

Input/Output

Exception Handling

Classes

Fun Challenges

Conclusion

Difference Between print() and cat()