How to mapply a function with multiple variables across multiple lists

Question

I'm a little out of my depth with mapply() and do.call...

So I have two lists like so:

ID          START           END
a1        1/1/2000       1/30/2000
a2        5/4/2000       3/1/2002
a3        5/8/2004       8/7/2005
a4        1/3/2012       5/7/2015


ID          START           END
b1        5/1/2000       1/30/2020
b2        6/4/2007       3/1/2008
b3        5/8/2014       8/7/2015
b4        1/3/1999       5/7/2019

Many of the dates overlap with each other, and that's what I'm trying to identify. I'm trying to create a column for each entry on the second list onto the first that says whether or not the date ranges overlap...

ID          START           END        b1      b2      b3     b4
a1        1/1/2000       1/30/2000      0       0       0      1
a2        5/4/2000       3/1/2002       1       0       0      1
a3        5/8/2004       8/7/2005       1       0       0      1
a4        1/3/2012       5/7/2015       1       0       1      1

where a 0 represents un-overlapping events, and 1 represents overlap.

My effort so far has been to use dplyr mutate in a function with multiple variables. Then I'm trying to use mapply to feed the whole lists in as those variables...

builder <- function(id,start,finish){
      resource_const_all <- resource_const %>% 
      mutate(id = ifelse(start > START & start < END,"1",
                  ifelse(finish > START & finish < END, "1",
                  ifelse(start < START & finish > END, "1", "0"))))
      }  
###if the start date falls in the date range, it returns 1.
###if the end date falls in the date range, it returns 1.
###if the start date is before the date range and the end date is after, it 
###returns 1.
###Else the dates don't overlap, returns 0.


builder_output <- mapply(builder,id_list,start_list,end_list))

Thanks for any help!

Answer 1

Assume the data shown reproducibly in the Note at the end where we ensure that the START and END columns are of Date class. Then use outer as shown.

Note that overlap is a generic test and overlapAB makes it specific to A and B .

No packages are used.

overlap <- function(start1, end1, start2, end2) {
  (start1 >= start2 & start1 <= end2) |  (start2 >= start1 & start2 <= end1)
}

overlapAB <- function(idA, idB) {
  i <- match(idA, A$ID)
  j <- match(idB, B$ID)
  overlap(A$START[i], A$END[i], B$START[j], B$END[j])
}

cbind(A, +outer(A$ID, B$ID, overlapAB))

giving:

  ID      START        END b1 b2 b3 b4
1 a1 2000-01-01 2000-01-30  0  0  0  1
2 a2 2000-05-04 2002-03-01  1  0  0  1
3 a3 2004-05-08 2005-08-07  1  0  0  1
4 a4 2012-01-03 2015-05-07  1  0  1  1

Note

LinesA <- "ID          START           END
a1        1/1/2000       1/30/2000
a2        5/4/2000       3/1/2002
a3        5/8/2004       8/7/2005
a4        1/3/2012       5/7/2015"

LinesB <- "ID          START           END
b1        5/1/2000       1/30/2020
b2        6/4/2007       3/1/2008
b3        5/8/2014       8/7/2015
b4        1/3/1999       5/7/2019"

fmt <- "%m/%d/%Y"
A <- read.table(text = LinesA, header = TRUE, as.is = TRUE)
A$START <- as.Date(A$START, fmt)
A$END <- as.Date(A$END, fmt)

B <- read.table(text = LinesB, header = TRUE, as.is = TRUE)
B$START <- as.Date(B$START, fmt)
B$END <- as.Date(B$END, fmt)