fill - R read.table columns shifted to the left -

i created file called test2.txt following information:

col1 col2 col3 col4 1       b  2       b  3       b  4       b  5       b  6       b  7            c 8            c 

when reading following command:

test.ws=read.table(paste(inputdir,'test2.txt',sep=''),fill=t,header=t) 

i following:

  col1 col2 col3 col4 1    1       b   na 2    2       b   na 3    3       b   na 4    4       b   na 5    5       b   na 6    6       b   na 7    7       c   na 8    8       c   na 

the columns shifted left. gives?!

i tried following:

> count.fields(paste(inputdir,'test.txt',sep='')) [1] 4 3 3 3 3 3 3 4 4 

and it's telling me number of tabs different, isn't! information? it's worth mention that, when importing .txt file excel, reads tabs correctly , doesn't skip or shift columns.

i tried assigning column names separately, didn't work:

colnames=names(test.ws) test.ws=read.table(paste(inputdir,'test2.txt',sep=''),skip=1,fill=t,header=t,col.names=colnames) 

yields:

warning message: in read.table(paste(inputdir, "test2.txt", sep = ""), skip = 1,  :   header , 'col.names' of different lengths 

i found similar issue online: https://stat.ethz.ch/pipermail/r-help/2008-july/166676.html. question wasn't answered.

if tab separated data, set separator accordingly: sep="\t". otherwise (from on read.table)

if sep = "" (the default read.table) separator ‘white space’, 1 or more spaces, tabs, newlines or carriage returns.

and multiple consecutive tabs being treated single delimiter.

or use read.delim instead of read.table has defaults better suited tab-separated data.