# Attribute Interface Methods for the Network Class These methods get, set, list, and delete attributes at the network, edge, and vertex level. ```r delete.edge.attribute(x, attrname, ...) ## S3 method for class 'network' delete.edge.attribute(x, attrname, ...) delete.network.attribute(x, attrname, ...) ## S3 method for class 'network' delete.network.attribute(x, attrname, ...) delete.vertex.attribute(x, attrname, ...) ## S3 method for class 'network' delete.vertex.attribute(x, attrname, ...) get.edge.attribute(x, ..., el) ## S3 method for class 'network' get.edge.attribute( x, attrname, unlist = TRUE, na.omit = FALSE, null.na = FALSE, deleted.edges.omit = FALSE, ..., el ) ## S3 method for class 'list' get.edge.attribute( x, attrname, unlist = TRUE, na.omit = FALSE, null.na = FALSE, deleted.edges.omit = FALSE, ..., el ) get.edge.value(x, ...) ## S3 method for class 'network' get.edge.value( x, attrname, unlist = TRUE, na.omit = FALSE, null.na = FALSE, deleted.edges.omit = FALSE, ... ) ## S3 method for class 'list' get.edge.value( x, attrname, unlist = TRUE, na.omit = FALSE, null.na = FALSE, deleted.edges.omit = FALSE, ... ) get.network.attribute(x, ...) ## S3 method for class 'network' get.network.attribute(x, attrname, unlist = FALSE, ...) get.vertex.attribute(x, ...) ## S3 method for class 'network' get.vertex.attribute( x, attrname, na.omit = FALSE, null.na = TRUE, unlist = TRUE, ... ) list.edge.attributes(x, ...) ## S3 method for class 'network' list.edge.attributes(x, ...) list.network.attributes(x, ...) ## S3 method for class 'network' list.network.attributes(x, ...) list.vertex.attributes(x, ...) ## S3 method for class 'network' list.vertex.attributes(x, ...) network.vertex.names(x) network.vertex.names(x) <- value set.edge.attribute(x, attrname, value, e, ...) ## S3 method for class 'network' set.edge.attribute(x, attrname, value, e = seq_along(x$mel), ...) set.edge.value(x, attrname, value, e, ...) ## S3 method for class 'network' set.edge.value(x, attrname, value, e = seq_along(x$mel), ...) set.network.attribute(x, attrname, value, ...) ## S3 method for class 'network' set.network.attribute(x, attrname, value, ...) set.vertex.attribute(x, attrname, value, v = seq_len(network.size(x)), ...) ## S3 method for class 'network' set.vertex.attribute(x, attrname, value, v = seq_len(network.size(x)), ...) ``` ## Arguments - `x`: an object of class `network`, or a list of edges (possibly `network$mel`) in `get.edge.attribute`. - `attrname`: the name of the attribute to get or set. - `...`: additional arguments - `el`: Deprecated; use `x` instead. - `unlist`: logical; should retrieved attribute values be `unlist`ed prior to being returned? - `na.omit`: logical; should retrieved attribute values corresponding to vertices/edges marked as 'missing' be removed? - `null.na`: logical; should `NULL` values (corresponding to vertices or edges with no values set for the attribute) be replaced with `NA`s in output? - `deleted.edges.omit`: logical: should the elements corresponding to deleted edges be removed? - `value`: values of the attribute to be set; these should be in `vector` or `list` form for the `edge` and `vertex` cases, or `matrix` form for `set.edge.value`. - `e`: IDs for the edges whose attributes are to be altered. - `v`: IDs for the vertices whose attributes are to be altered. ## Returns For the `list.attributes` methods, a vector containing attribute names. For the `get.attribute` methods, a list containing the values of the attribute in question (or simply the value itself, for `get.network.attribute`). For the `set.attribute` and `delete.attribute` methods, a pointer to the updated `network` object. ## Details The `list.attributes` functions return the names of all edge, network, or vertex attributes (respectively) in the network. All attributes need not be defined for all elements; the union of all extant attributes for the respective element type is returned. The `get.attribute` functions look for an edge, network, or vertex attribute (respectively) with the name `attrname`, returning its values. Note that, to retrieve an edge attribute from all edges within a network `x`, `x$mel` should be used as the first argument to `get.edge.attribute`; `get.edge.value` is a convenience function which does this automatically. As of v1.7.2, if a `network` object is passed to `get.edge.attribute` it will automatically call `get.edge.value` instead of returning NULL. When the parameters `na.omit`, or `deleted.edges.omit` are used, the position index of the attribute values returned will not correspond to the vertex/edge id. To preserved backward compatibility, if the edge attribute `attrname` does not exist for any edge, `get.edge.attribute` will still return `NULL` even if `null.na=TRUE` `network.vertex.names` is a convenience function to extract the `"vertex.names"` attribute from all vertices. The `set.attribute` functions allow one to set the values of edge, network, or vertex attributes. `set.edge.value` is a convenience function which allows edge attributes to be given in adjacency matrix form, and the assignment form of `network.vertex.names` is likewise a convenient front-end to `set.vertex.attribute` for vertex names. The `delete.attribute` functions, by contrast, remove the named attribute from the network, from all edges, or from all vertices (as appropriate). If `attrname` is a vector of attribute names, each will be removed in turn. These functions modify their arguments in place, although a pointer to the modified object is also (invisibly) returned. Additional practical example of how to load and attach attributes are on the `loading.attributes` page. Some attribute assignment/extraction can be performed conveniently through the various extraction/replacement operators, although they may be less efficient. See the associated man page for details. ## Note As of version 1.9 the `set.vertex.attribute` function can accept and modify multiple attributes in a single call to improve efficiency. For this case `attrname` can be a list or vector of attribute names and `value` is a list of values corresponding to the elements of `attrname` (can also be a list of lists of values if elements in v should have different values). ## Examples ```r #Create a network with three edges m<-matrix(0,3,3) m[1,2]<-1; m[2,3]<-1; m[3,1]<-1 g<-network(m) #Create a matrix of values corresponding to edges mm<-m mm[1,2]<-7; mm[2,3]<-4; mm[3,1]<-2 #Assign some attributes set.edge.attribute(g,"myeval",3:5) set.edge.value(g,"myeval2",mm) set.network.attribute(g,"mygval","boo") set.vertex.attribute(g,"myvval",letters[1:3]) network.vertex.names(g) <- LETTERS[1:10] #List the attributes list.edge.attributes(g) list.network.attributes(g) list.vertex.attributes(g) #Retrieve the attributes get.edge.attribute(g$mel,"myeval") #Note the first argument! get.edge.value(g,"myeval") #Another way to do this get.edge.attribute(g$mel,"myeval2") get.network.attribute(g,"mygval") get.vertex.attribute(g,"myvval") network.vertex.names(g) #Purge the attributes delete.edge.attribute(g,"myeval") delete.edge.attribute(g,"myeval2") delete.network.attribute(g,"mygval") delete.vertex.attribute(g,"myvval") #Verify that the attributes are gone list.edge.attributes(g) list.network.attributes(g) list.vertex.attributes(g) #Note that we can do similar things using operators g %n% "mygval" <- "boo" #Set attributes, as above g %v% "myvval" <- letters[1:3] g %e% "myeval" <- mm g[,,names.eval="myeval"] <- mm #Another way to do this g %n% "mygval" #Retrieve the attributes g %v% "myvval" g %e% "mevval" as.sociomatrix(g,"myeval") # Or like this ``` ## References Butts, C. T. (2008). network: a Package for Managing Relational Data in R. **Journal of Statistical Software**, 24(2). tools:::Rd_expr_doi("10.18637/jss.v024.i02") ## See Also `loading.attributes`,`network`, `as.network.matrix`, `as.sociomatrix`, `as.matrix.network`, `network.extraction` ## Author(s) Carter T. Butts buttsc@uci.edu

attribute.methods function