There is naturally a need for such a tool.
Interactive editing of graphs would be
really useful.
Some readers may recall that at the height of
the Cold War subtle (and not so subtle) shifts
in power and policy at the Kremlin had to be
inferred from what was visible to everyone
(which was not much). For example,
the absence of a formerly key person from the
podium line-up at the May Day parade of military
might could be guessed as attributable to
1. a diary mix-up.
2. a very bad head-cold.
3. re-assignment to run a tractor factory
100 km NE of Novosibirsk.
4. death from old-age or over-consumption
of bullets.
This fragile science was sometimes called
"Kremlinology".
Stata users sometimes have to resort
to "StataCorpology", which is basically
guessing in the dark on the basis of smoke signals,
wild surmise, what was mentioned at users'
meetings, etc.; as StataCorp will not,
on the whole, announce in public (a) what major
projects they are working on or (b) when they
are going to be released, until just before release.
(And historically Statalisters get an edge on
every other form of public announcement.)
Why? Some meta-guesses:
1. Commercial prudence.
2. Not wanting to make promises that might prove
impossible to keep. Graphics particularly has
been embarrassing here from time to time; the
people concerned do not want to do that ever again.
(Note that StataCorp,
by software standards, are very good at doing
what they promise, or something better. It is
just that it sometimes takes several years.)
3. Too many unknowns.
After that mountain of waffle from a StataCorpologist,
here is my molehill of answer:
1. I believe it to be still in the pipeline.
2. I also believe it to be unlikely to appear
in the immediate future.
Nick
[email protected]
Allan Reese
>
> One question sent repeatedly to StataCorp through the 1990s
> was when they
> were going to update Stage - the Stata Graphics Editor.
> The answer was
> always that a new graphic system would provide all the
> functionality.
> While the graph command has been considerably enhanced, and
> virtually
> anything can be drawn, I would like to resurrect the
> question. Obviously
> the old Stage is completely non-usable with recent graph
> file formats.
>
> The users who are unfamiliar, Stage was a separate program
> that read a
> Stata .gph file into a window and then allowed selection of
> parts of the
> graph for editing of attributes. The structure was
> hierarchical. For
> example, you could select a line, move down to the set of
> points, and down
> again to step through individual points. It was NOT mouse-driven
> (cheers), but was a distinctive and highly-effective
> approach. There was
> an underlying command language, so you could save the audit
> trail of edits
> or even write a batch job to edit further graphs consistently.
>
> Does no-one else see the need for such a tool?
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