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Re: st: Writing macro contents to a file


From   [email protected] (Jeff Pitblado, Stata Corp.)
To   [email protected]
Subject   Re: st: Writing macro contents to a file
Date   Wed, 25 Jun 2003 12:43:27 -0500

Roger Newson <[email protected]> asks about outputting text to files with
the -file- command:
 
> A query re writing the contents of a Stata macro to a file. I have been 
> trying to do this by using -file write-, with a file open for writing as an 
> ASCII file, as I have not found a way of writing  macro contents to a 
> binary file. For instance, if the macro is a local macro named -linecur-, 
> and the file handle is stored in another local macro named -uhandle-, then 
> I might write
> 
> file write `uhandle'  `"`linecur'"' _n
> 
> to write the contents of the macro -linecur- to the file whose handle is 
> stored in -uhandle-.
> 
> There is one problem with this approach, namely that it involves quoting. 
> When Stata quotes a string, it substitutes each occurrence of the substring 
> \\ (double backslash) with a \ (single backslash). This will cause problems 
> if my macro -linecur- contains double backslashes. For instance, if 
> -linecur- contains the string
> 
> \textit{Make}&\textit{Weight}\\
> 
> then the -file- command shown above will write, to the file, the string
> 
> \textit{Make}&\textit{Weight}\
> 
> ...
> 
> Why should this be the case? And does anybody out there know of a better 
> way to output the contents of a macro to a file? I am using Stata 8 under 
> Windows 98 SE. The full log of what I did is listed below.
> 
> ...

I believe -macval()- will solve the problem.  The second -file write- command
below uses -macval()- to output the contents of -`linecur'- to the file.

***** BEGIN:
. tempname uhandle

. local linecur "\textit{Make}&\textit{Weight}\\\\"

. mac li _linecur
_linecur:       \textit{Make}&\textit{Weight}\\

. file open `uhandle' using nutz.txt, write text replace

. file write `uhandle'  `"`linecur'"' _n

. file write `uhandle'  `"`macval(linecur)'"' _n

. file close `uhandle'

. type nutz.txt
\textit{Make}&\textit{Weight}\
\textit{Make}&\textit{Weight}\\

***** END:

--Jeff
[email protected]
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