RE: st: r(610)

["Schaffer, Mark E" <M.E.Schaffer@hw.ac.uk>]

The most important reason imho isn't in Nick's list: precision in
-outsheet- is determined by display format (!), and if you don't realise
this, the consequences are nasty.  I was bitten by this recently:

http://www.stata.com/statalist/archive/2011-01/msg00310.html

--Mark

> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-statalist@hsphsun2.harvard.edu 
> [mailto:owner-statalist@hsphsun2.harvard.edu] On Behalf Of Nick Cox
> Sent: Tuesday, January 25, 2011 4:03 PM
> To: statalist@hsphsun2.harvard.edu
> Subject: Re: st: r(610)
> 
> Using -saveold- is indeed generally preferable to exporting the data
> as a text file for precisely the reasons you identified, the likely
> loss of e.g. variable labels, display formats, characteristics
> (including notes).
> 
> Nick
> 
> On Tue, Jan 25, 2011 at 3:56 PM, POPE, REBECCA <RPOPE@uams.edu> wrote:
> > I saw Nick's post mentioning both solutions, as well as 
> Aggie's follow-up question about insheeting. However, I 
> didn't see a post noting the virtues of one approach over the 
> other, which seemed relevant. If Nick already posted that, it 
> didn't arrive on my end & I apologize to the list for being 
> duplicative. I'll try to catch it in the archives later.
> >
> > If you were referring only to Nick's post about potential 
> solutions and nothing was posted about why Aggie might want 
> to ask her friend to use -saveold- instead of the 
> -outsheet/insheet-, I would truly appreciate feedback on my 
> view of _why_ it would be preferable for Aggie to ask her 
> friend to use -saveold-. I ask this as much for my 
> edification as a Stata user (since I frequently use 
> -saveold-) as for Aggie's information.
> >
> > Here is the text from my original post:
> > "I'm away from my computer right now so if someone else 
> could confirm that would be great, but I think that would 
> preserve any formatting, labels, notes, etc that Aggie's 
> friend had applied to the data. That would save Aggie 
> duplicating any pre-analysis prep work."
> >
> > p.s. I read the help guide when I got back to my office and 
> it only explicitly mentions labels. The woman I normally send 
> the data sets to isn't in yet, so I can't confirm formats and 
> notes myself as a benefit of -saveold- over -outsheet/insheet-.
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Rebecca
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: owner-statalist@hsphsun2.harvard.edu 
> [mailto:owner-statalist@hsphsun2.harvard.edu] On Behalf Of 
> Neil Shephard
> > Sent: Tuesday, January 25, 2011 8:41 AM
> > To: statalist@hsphsun2.harvard.edu
> > Subject: Re: st: r(610)
> >
> > On Tue, Jan 25, 2011 at 2:37 PM, POPE, REBECCA 
> <RPOPE@uams.edu> wrote:
> >> If Aggie is already asking her friend to send a new data 
> set, is it preferable for her to ask for her friend to save 
> the existing Stata set using the -saveold- command?
> >
> > Thats what Nick had suggested in his first reply in this thread.
> >
> > Aggie then asked how to read text files, hence the suggestions.
> >
> 
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