Arguments passed on to dplyr::left_join

x,y

A pair of data frames, data frame extensions (e.g. a tibble), or lazy data frames (e.g. from dbplyr or dtplyr). See Methods, below, for more details.

by

A join specification created with join_by(), or a character vector of variables to join by.

If NULL, the default, ⁠*_join()⁠ will perform a natural join, using all variables in common across x and y. A message lists the variables so that you can check they're correct; suppress the message by supplying by explicitly.

To join on different variables between x and y, use a join_by() specification. For example, join_by(a == b) will match x$a to y$b.

To join by multiple variables, use a join_by() specification with multiple expressions. For example, join_by(a == b, c == d) will match x$a to y$b and x$c to y$d. If the column names are the same between x and y, you can shorten this by listing only the variable names, like join_by(a, c).

join_by() can also be used to perform inequality, rolling, and overlap joins. See the documentation at ?join_by for details on these types of joins.

For simple equality joins, you can alternatively specify a character vector of variable names to join by. For example, by = c("a", "b") joins x$a to y$a and x$b to y$b. If variable names differ between x and y, use a named character vector like by = c("x_a" = "y_a", "x_b" = "y_b").

To perform a cross-join, generating all combinations of x and y, see cross_join().

copy

If x and y are not from the same data source, and copy is TRUE, then y will be copied into the same src as x. This allows you to join tables across srcs, but it is a potentially expensive operation so you must opt into it.

suffix

If there are non-joined duplicate variables in x and y, these suffixes will be added to the output to disambiguate them. Should be a character vector of length 2.

keep

Should the join keys from both x and y be preserved in the output?

• If NULL, the default, joins on equality retain only the keys from x, while joins on inequality retain the keys from both inputs.

• If TRUE, all keys from both inputs are retained.

• If FALSE, only keys from x are retained. For right and full joins, the data in key columns corresponding to rows that only exist in y are merged into the key columns from x. Can't be used when joining on inequality conditions.

What should happen when the number of rows changes from a join? Options include: 'error', 'warning', or 'message'. By default 'error'.

What is the expected relationship between x and y? At this time the only available option is '*:1', indicating a many to one relationship between x and y. In the future more options may be added.