Methods to save data frame in file in R

When you try to "save" your data set in a data frame object in R, you have several options:

Method	Pro	Con	Funcitons
Image the object in binary format	Fast, can keep object name and other environment information	R specific	save(df, file= "filename") rm(df) load("filename", .GlobalEnv)
Save in coded text	Full information, e.g. data mode	Size is big, can not exchange with other software	dump(c("df"),"filename") newDf = source(“filename")$value
Export  to plain text	Human readable, and software exchangeable	May need to recast R types when read in	write.table() read.table()
Export to other format	Software specific	Software specific	Write.X() Read.X(), where X can be spss, sas,csv, excel