Statalist


[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date index][Thread index]

st: =?UTF-8?B?UkU6IFLDqXAuIDogUmU6IHN0OiBkYXRlIGZvcm1hdCBp?==?UTF-8?B?biAtdGFib3V0LQ==?=


From   "Nick Cox" <[email protected]>
To   <[email protected]>
Subject   st: =?UTF-8?B?UkU6IFLDqXAuIDogUmU6IHN0OiBkYXRlIGZvcm1hdCBp?==?UTF-8?B?biAtdGFib3V0LQ==?=
Date   Thu, 24 Apr 2008 12:42:15 +0100

(Add acute accents below as appropriate.) 

Herve solved his problem with various assists, notably from Svend Juul. 

Still up in the air is his report about -tostring-. 

-tostring- is in essence designed to be a smart wrapper for -string()-. 
It is not, however, smart about dates. 

Recall that to Stata a daily date is just an integer like 15156. So, by default, -tostring- will just map that to the equivalent string "15156". That works; it just isn't what Herve wants. 

The help shows various ways round this. For example, you can say

tostring fyr, generate(fyr2) usedisplayformat 

but that won't get you a result. The main purpose of -tostring- is to protect you from nasty side-effects of using -string()-. Otherwise, you might as well just use -string()- directly. The main way -tostring- does that is to check that your transformation is reversible, i.e. that -real(string())- will give you back what you started with. If your transformation is reversible, -tostring- loses no information. If it isn't, -tostring- won't proceed unless you insist. 

So for example -real(string(15156))- certainly gives you back 15156, which is fine. But with Herve's display format you would be trying e.g. -real("30 Jun 01")- and that will give you missing because -real()- doesn't know about dates. In fact, the criterion that -real(string()) returns the original is too strict for dates, but -tostring- doesn't know about dates. 

The ways forward are, it seems,  

1. Using -string()- directly, as Svend recommended. 

2. Adding the -force- option in -tostring-. You are saying that you know more than -tostring-. Fine if true, dangerous if not. It's only a program. 

3. StataCorp to think about doing something to -tostring-. My own take is that this is not classifiable as a bug, just something that bites occasionally and for which there are easy work-arounds. 

Nick 
[email protected] 

Herve STOLOWY

I tried to convert the date into string with:
tostring fyr, generate(fyr2)

but it does not work. I get a variable with numbers:

    +-------------------+
       |       fyr    fyr2 |
       |-------------------|
    1. | 30 Jun 01   15156 |
    2. | 30 Jun 02   15521 |
    3. | 30 Jun 03   15886 |
    4. | 31 Dec 04   16436 |
    5. | 31 Dec 05   16801 |

Would you know how to make this conversion?


*
*   For searches and help try:
*   http://www.stata.com/support/faqs/res/findit.html
*   http://www.stata.com/support/statalist/faq
*   http://www.ats.ucla.edu/stat/stata/



© Copyright 1996–2024 StataCorp LLC   |   Terms of use   |   Privacy   |   Contact us   |   What's new   |   Site index