B. Water:
I understand that your var1-varn are string variables. For strings, the
missing value typically is a blank, not a period, so I would first:
foreach V of varlist var1-varn {
replace `V'="" if `V'=="."
}
If you feel unsecure about the above construct, you might instead give
as many replace commands as you have variables:
replace var1="" if var1=="."
...
Now you can use egen's robs() function with the strok option:
egen nonmiss = robs(var1-varn) , strok
In Stata 9 the robs() function got the more telling name rownonmiss().
Now, the variable -nonmiss- tells the number of nonmissing (i.e.
non-blank) values for each observation. Wasn't that what you were
looking for?
Hope this helps
Svend
__________________________________________
Svend Juul
Institut for Folkesundhed, Afdeling for Epidemiologi
(Institute of Public Health, Department of Epidemiology)
Vennelyst Boulevard 6
DK-8000 Aarhus C, Denmark
Phone: +45 8942 6090
Home: +45 8693 7796
Email: [email protected]
__________________________________________
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