st: Creating macro varlist for loop - different outcomes with different methods?

[Felix Acker <facker@vichealth.vic.gov.au>]

Hello All,

I have encountered a problem in running a loop on a varlist. My dataset consists of 112 variables, nearly all of them have unique names. I would like to assign them to macros in blocks, for example variable 15 (name = weight) to variable 20 (name = abstinence). I would then like to run a loop on this varlist, using a very basic command such as 'tab' and am expecting separate tables for each variable. When I individually type the variable names for the varlist: 

local TableItems Weight LGA TypeOfWork PosInLocal Aware Abstinence 
foreach x in `TableItems' { 
tab `x', sort 
}

This works just fine. 
However, when I use the hyphen method to create the varlist, the variables seem to be bound different, in that I get an error message for more than two variables, and a two-way table if my varlist consists of two variables only.

local TableItems Weight-Abstinence
foreach x in `TableItems' {
tab `x', sort
}

Would anyone happen to know why this occurs, and how to get around it? In the case of 5 variables, it is easy enough to type them out, but it surely should be possible to do this more efficiently.

Thanks for your help and best from Melbourne,
Felix Acker

Dr Felix Acker
Senior Project Officer
Knowledge and Environments for Health
Victorian Health Promotion Foundation (VicHealth)
15-31 Pelham Street  Carlton  Victoria  3053

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