The BrailleR package Example 2

A. Jonathan R. Godfrey

The BrailleR package Example 2.

Basic numerical summaries

The standard presentation of a summary of a data frame where each variable is given its own column is difficult for a screen reader user to read as the processing of information is done line by line. For example:

summary(airquality)
     Ozone           Solar.R           Wind             Temp      
 Min.   :  1.00   Min.   :  7.0   Min.   : 1.700   Min.   :56.00  
 1st Qu.: 18.00   1st Qu.:115.8   1st Qu.: 7.400   1st Qu.:72.00  
 Median : 31.50   Median :205.0   Median : 9.700   Median :79.00  
 Mean   : 42.13   Mean   :185.9   Mean   : 9.958   Mean   :77.88  
 3rd Qu.: 63.25   3rd Qu.:258.8   3rd Qu.:11.500   3rd Qu.:85.00  
 Max.   :168.00   Max.   :334.0   Max.   :20.700   Max.   :97.00  
 NA's   :37       NA's   :7                                       
     Month            Day      
 Min.   :5.000   Min.   : 1.0  
 1st Qu.:6.000   1st Qu.: 8.0  
 Median :7.000   Median :16.0  
 Mean   :6.993   Mean   :15.8  
 3rd Qu.:8.000   3rd Qu.:23.0  
 Max.   :9.000   Max.   :31.0  
                               

The VI() command actually calls the VI.data.frame() command. It then processes each variable one by one so that the results are printed variable by variable instead of summary statistic by summary statistic. For example:

VI(airquality)

The summary of each variable is
Ozone: Min. 1   1st Qu. 18   Median 31.5   Mean 42.1293103448276   3rd Qu. 63.25   Max. 168   NA's 37  
Solar.R: Min. 7   1st Qu. 115.75   Median 205   Mean 185.931506849315   3rd Qu. 258.75   Max. 334   NA's 7  
Wind: Min. 1.7   1st Qu. 7.4   Median 9.7   Mean 9.95751633986928   3rd Qu. 11.5   Max. 20.7  
Temp: Min. 56   1st Qu. 72   Median 79   Mean 77.8823529411765   3rd Qu. 85   Max. 97  
Month: Min. 5   1st Qu. 6   Median 7   Mean 6.99346405228758   3rd Qu. 8   Max. 9  
Day: Min. 1   1st Qu. 8   Median 16   Mean 15.8039215686275   3rd Qu. 23   Max. 31  

Important features

Note that in this case, the blind student could choose to present the summary of each variable as generated by the VI() command, or the output from the standard summary() command. There is no difference in the information that is ultimately presented in this case.