numr_replace() or numr_substitute()?

[joeroe]

Which to use as the default for formatting numerals? numr_replace() uses string replacement; numr_substitute() decomposes a numeric into digits and directly subsets the numerals matrix.

I was hoping numr_substitute() would be faster, but it isn't (yet):

library("numerals")

x <- floor(runif(1000) * 1e6)

bench::mark(
  numr_substitute(x, "fa")
)
#> Warning: Some expressions had a GC in every iteration; so filtering is disabled.
#> # A tibble: 1 x 6
#>   expression                    min   median `itr/sec` mem_alloc `gc/sec`
#>   <bch:expr>               <bch:tm> <bch:tm>     <dbl> <bch:byt>    <dbl>
#> 1 numr_substitute(x, "fa")   18.9ms     21ms      45.2        NA     68.7

bench::mark(
  numr_replace(x, "fa")
)
#> # A tibble: 1 x 6
#>   expression                 min   median `itr/sec` mem_alloc `gc/sec`
#>   <bch:expr>            <bch:tm> <bch:tm>     <dbl> <bch:byt>    <dbl>
#> 1 numr_replace(x, "fa")   8.51ms   8.54ms      112.        NA        0

But I do suspect numr_substitute() is more robust to e.g. character encoding and locale issues.