Arrange data frame by all columns using dplyr

Question

I am generating data frames of 1s and 0s as follows:

library(tidyverse)
library(glue)

num_var <- 3

rep(list(c(0L, 1L)), num_var) %>%
  set_names(glue("var_{seq_len(num_var)}")) %>%
  expand.grid() %>%
  mutate(total = rowSums(.)) %>%
  select(total, everything()) %>%
  arrange(total, desc(var_1, var_2, var_3))

#>   total var_1 var_2 var_3
#> 1     0     0     0     0
#> 2     1     1     0     0
#> 3     1     0     1     0
#> 4     1     0     0     1
#> 5     2     1     1     0
#> 6     2     1     0     1
#> 7     2     0     1     1
#> 8     3     1     1     1

Created on 2018-01-08 by the reprex package (v0.1.1.9000).

I would need to arrange by the total sum of the variable in ascending order, and then each variable in descending order. This is fairly straightforward using dplyr::arrange() . However, I would like to have a more robust method of arranging. For example, if num_var is changed to, then, the final line must also be changed to arrange(total, desc(var_1, var_2, var_3, var_4)) . I have tried using the tidy selector everything() to arrange as I do with the select() function, but this errors:

library(tidyverse)
library(glue)

num_var <- 3

rep(list(c(0L, 1L)), num_var) %>%
  set_names(glue("var_{seq_len(num_var)}")) %>%
  expand.grid() %>%
  mutate(total = rowSums(.)) %>%
  select(total, everything()) %>%
  arrange(total, desc(everything()))

#> Error in arrange_impl(.data, dots): Evaluation error: No tidyselect variables were registered.

Created on 2018-01-08 by the reprex package (v0.1.1.9000).

Is there a way to select variables for arranging without naming them all directly?

Answer 1

arrange doesn't seem to work with select helper functions directly. You may use arrange_at , total in ascending order, and other variables except total (select using -one_of("total") ) in descending order:

arrange_at(vars(total, desc(-one_of("total"))))

#  total var_1 var_2 var_3
#1     0     0     0     0
#2     1     1     0     0
#3     1     0     1     0
#4     1     0     0     1
#5     2     1     1     0
#6     2     1     0     1
#7     2     0     1     1
#8     3     1     1     1

Answer 2

could arrange by every column going left to right using this code

library(magrittr) ; library(rlang) ; library(dplyr)
data %>% arrange(!!!syms(colnames(.)))

this works since arrange doesnt accept tidyselect syntax and thus must be passed symbols (or maybe also strings) for each of the names