Huxtable package: How to prevent scientific notation in table footnote years?

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1

I’m having trouble with the huxtable package in R. I want to add a footnote with a 4-digit year to my table, but it keeps showing up in scientific notation. Here’s what I’ve tried:

options(scipen = 100, digits = 10)
library(huxtable)
my_table <- huxtable(mtcars[1:5, 1:2])
number_format(my_table) <- 1
add_footnote(my_table, "No automobiles in 1776")

The footnote comes out as “No automobiles in 1.78e+03”. I thought setting number_format() would fix this, but it doesn’t seem to work for footnotes. If I remove that line, the whole table goes back to scientific notation.

I also tried putting the year in quotes, but that just gives me an error. Does anyone know how to keep the year as a regular number in the footnote? Any help would be great!

2

hey sparklingGem, had similar issues. try this: add_footnote(my_table, “No automobiles in \num{1776}”). the \num{} macro forces it to display as a regular number. worked for me! lmk if it helps or if u need more info

3

I’ve run into this exact issue before with huxtable, and it can be frustrating! The trick I found is to use the escape_contents parameter when adding the footnote. Here’s what worked for me:

add_footnote(my_table, 'No automobiles in 1776', escape_contents = FALSE)

This tells huxtable not to treat the footnote text as a number that needs formatting. It should display the year as-is.

Another approach that sometimes helps is to force the year to be treated as text by adding a space after it:

add_footnote(my_table, 'No automobiles in 1776 ')

The trailing space prevents R from interpreting it as a number. Just make sure to adjust your text accordingly if you use this method.

Hope this helps solve your issue! Let me know if you need any clarification.

4

I’ve encountered this problem with huxtable as well. A workaround I’ve found effective is to wrap the year in backticks within the footnote text. This treats it as inline code, preventing any automatic formatting:

add_footnote(my_table, "No automobiles in `1776`")

This method preserves the original number format without resorting to escape_contents, which can sometimes cause issues with other formatting in complex tables.

Another option is to use a Unicode non-breaking space before the year:

add_footnote(my_table, paste0("No automobiles in ", "\u00A0", "1776"))

This keeps the year intact while maintaining a clean appearance in the footnote.