st: really silly question

[Scott Talkington <talkings@gmu.edu>]

The stuff that stumps me in stata is usually something so simple that 
it's impossible to find a help file or a faq that deals with it in 
simple terms.

I want to write a program that obtains a variable name from keyboard 
input and then executes a series of commands on that variable.  This 
should be pretty simple programming but I can't find a simple 
description of it.

lets say I want to fill a local variable `x' with one variable name and 
a local variable `y' with another variable name than then execute the 
command

.tab `x' `y'

and then at the end of the loop it just stops and waits for the keyboard 
input again

Isn't there a simple and obvious way to do this?  Or is it so obvious 
that it's never mentioned?  It's driving me nuts.
*
*   For searches and help try:
*   http://www.stata.com/help.cgi?search
*   http://www.stata.com/support/statalist/faq
*   http://www.ats.ucla.edu/stat/stata/