readxl not compatible with openxlsx

[luisvalenzuelar]

Hi there,

readxl does not preserve the class of a dataframe saved with openxslx package. Since readxl does not create xlsx files, one must use a package like openxlsx. But since the latter also opens xlsx files and does preserve class, ones asks why readxl is needed at all. It would be better if readxl could preserve the class of created excel files.

# create dataframe
df <- data.frame("var" = c(seq(1,10)))
class(df) # results is "data.frame"
# Export as xlsx
library(openxlsx)
write.xlsx(df,"df.xlsx", overwrite = TRUE)
# Import as xlsx
library(readxl)
df <- read_excel("df.xlsx")
# Check class of imported object
class(df) # results is "tbl_df"     "tbl"        "data.frame"

[jennybc]

readxl returns a "tibble", which is a sub-class of data.frame.

https://tibble.tidyverse.org

ones asks why readxl is needed at all

readxl is one of the most downloaded packages on CRAN, so many people do find it useful. You are welcome to use openxlsx if you wish.