cbind a dataframe with an empty dataframe - cbind.fill?

Question

I think I\'m looking for an analog of rbind.fill (in Hadley\'s plyr package) for cbind. I looked, but there is no cbind.fill

Answer 1

We could add id column then use merge:

df1 <- mtcars[1:5, 1:2]
#                    mpg cyl id
# Mazda RX4         21.0   6  1
# Mazda RX4 Wag     21.0   6  2
# Datsun 710        22.8   4  3
# Hornet 4 Drive    21.4   6  4
# Hornet Sportabout 18.7   8  5

df2 <- mtcars[6:7, 3:4]
#            disp  hp
# Valiant     225 105
# Duster 360  360 245

#Add id column then merge
df1$id <- seq(nrow(df1)) 
df2$id <- seq(nrow(df2)) 

merge(df1, df2, by = "id", all.x = TRUE, check.names = FALSE)
#   id  mpg cyl disp  hp
# 1  1 21.0   6  225 105
# 2  2 21.0   6  360 245
# 3  3 22.8   4   NA  NA
# 4  4 21.4   6   NA  NA
# 5  5 18.7   8   NA  NA