Split Single Column into Multiple

Load library and test.csv

library(tidyverse)
library(here)
# read test csv containing coordinate pairs
test <- read_csv(here('test', 'test.csv'))

Glimpse test data set containing coordinate pairs

# glimpse test data
glimpse(test)

## Rows: 2
## Columns: 1
## $ testcolumn <chr> "[{'y':50,'x':50}, {'y':53','x':35}]", "[{'y':55,'x':35}, {…

Use seperate_wider_delim to split single column into multiple

# split test field into multiple columns
test2 <- separate_wider_delim(test, 
                     # delimiter, in this case, I used ','
                     delim=',',
                     # input column/field in data frame to split, 
                     cols=testcolumn,
                     # enter name of the new columns to be created (sequential based on delimiter)
                     names=c("start_y", "start_x","end_y","end_x"), too_many="merge") %>%
  # mutate across all column and parse numbers
  mutate(across(everything(), ~ readr::parse_number(.x)))
# resulting data frame with multiple columns (still needs some cleaning but mostly there!)
glimpse(test2)

## Rows: 2
## Columns: 4
## $ start_y <dbl> 50, 55
## $ start_x <dbl> 50, 35
## $ end_y   <dbl> 53, 19
## $ end_x   <dbl> 35, 75

head(test2)

## # A tibble: 2 × 4
##   start_y start_x end_y end_x
##     <dbl>   <dbl> <dbl> <dbl>
## 1      50      50    53    35
## 2      55      35    19    75