Multiple pairwise differences based on column name patterns

Question

I have a data.table, dt:

dt

Id  v1 v2 v3 x1 x2 x3
1   7  1  3  5  6  8
2   1  3  5  6  8  5
3   3  5  6  8  5  1

v1, v2, v3 an

Answer 1

You could split by whether the column contains x and then take the difference of the resulting data tables.

new_cols <- 
  do.call('-', split.default(dt[,-1], grepl('x', names(dt)[-1])))

dt[, paste0('diff', seq_along(new_cols)) := new_cols]

dt
#    Id v1 v2 v3 x1 x2 x3 diff1 diff2 diff3
# 1:  1  7  1  3  5  6  8     2    -5    -5
# 2:  2  1  3  5  6  8  5    -5    -5     0
# 3:  3  3  5  6  8  5  1    -5     0     5

Or using similar logic to the code snippet in the question you could do

newnames <- paste0("diff",1:3)
v <- paste0("v",1:3)
x <- paste0("x",1:3)

dt[, (newnames) := Map('-', mget(v), mget(x))]

dt
#    Id v1 v2 v3 x1 x2 x3 diff1 diff2 diff3
# 1:  1  7  1  3  5  6  8     2    -5    -5
# 2:  2  1  3  5  6  8  5    -5    -5     0
# 3:  3  3  5  6  8  5  1    -5     0     5