Introduction to Stata 8

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3.2. Handling output Stata's output facilities are less than optimal. In this section I show how you can use the thirdparty program NoteTab to handle output for editing and printing. The Results window The output immediately appears in the Results window. You may print all of the Results window (be careful!) or a selected part of it. However, manoeuvring is more restricted than in a text editor, and you can use only the mouse, not the keyboard, to highlight a section. You cannot edit its contents. If you, like me, dislike the output interruptions by -more- you can: set more off [, permanently] The size of the Results window buffer is restricted, and you only have access to the last few pages of output. To increase the buffer size (default 32,000 bytes) permanently: set scrollbufsize 200000 The Viewer window This window is excellent to examine help files, see section 4. [GSW] section 3 and 17 also describe how to use it to examine and print output, but it is much too inflexible. The SMCLformatted output is a mixed blessing, with parts of a table in bold, parts in plain text. And actually only the [GSW] manual uses SMCL-formatted output, the others use plain text. The log files and NoteTab You may generate two log files, a full log and a command log. [GSW] section 17 tells how to open and close log files. That didn't work well for me; I often forgot to open a log file. Now I let the start-up file profile.do create the log files automatically, see section 1.2. The full log (c:\tmp\stata.log) is a copy of what you saw in the Results window. I use it to inspect, edit and print output in NoteTab. I selected plain ASCII text for the full log; it is overwritten next time you start Stata or when you issue the newlog command. The nt command gives you rapid access to your output in NoteTab. See appendix 3 on how to create both commands. The command log (c:\tmp\cmdlog.txt) includes all commands issued. It is cumulative, i.e. new commands are added to the file, which is not overwritten next time Stata is opened. You may use it instead of the Review window to see and recover previous commands. Copying a table to a word processor document. You might want to use a Stata table for publication. Copying a table directly to a word processor document does not work well, but you may use Excel as an intermediary: 1. Highlight the table in the Results window. Right-click it and select Copy Table 2. Open Excel and paste the table to it ([Ctrl]+V). Edit the table if needed. 3. Copy-and-paste the table from Excel to your document. To do the trick correctly, Windows must be set to display decimal periods (unless you in Stata chose set dp comma). 8
4. Getting help [GSW] 4, 19, 20; [U] 2, 8 4.1. The manuals See recommendations in Appendix 1. 4.2. Online help [GSW] 4; [U] 8, 32 Online help is best displayed in the Viewer window (see section 2 and 3). Issue help and search from the Viewer's command line, whelp and findit from the Stata command line. Keep your Stata updated – then your online help is updated too. help and whelp If you know the command name (e.g. tabulate) see the help file (tabulate.hlp) by: help tabulate from the Viewer command line: or whelp tabulate from Stata’s command line window The help file is displayed in the Viewer window, and from here you may print it. You may also use the links included. Try it. search and findit. Using the menus You need not know the command name. Get information about nonparametric tests by: search nonparametric from the Viewer command line To search Stata and the net for information on goodness-of-fit tests with poisson regression: findit poisson goodness from Stata’s command line window You may also use the menus to locate a command: Statistics ► Summaries, tables & tests ► Nonparametric tests and find quite a few procedures. FAQs (Frequently asked questions) Try www.stata.com/support/faqs. This site includes a lot of advice on various topics. Statalist and the Danish Statanewcomerlist Statalist is a forum for questions from users; see www.stata.com/support/statalist. A Danish list especially for newcomers has been established by University of Southern Denmark and Aarhus University; see www.biostat.sdu.dk/statalist.html. Error messages Stata's short error messages include a code, e.g. r(131). The code is a link, and by clicking it you get more clues. Some error messages, however, are not very informative. 9
Page 1 and 2: Introduction to Stata 8 Svend Juul
Page 3 and 4: Preface Stata is a software package
Page 5 and 6: 1. Installing, customizing and upda
Page 7 and 8: 2. Windows in Stata [GSW] 2 I Sugge
Page 9: 3. Suggested mode of operation The
Page 13 and 14: 6. Variables A Stata data set is re
Page 15 and 16: 7. Command syntax [U] 14.1 Stata is
Page 17 and 18: y and bysort prefix [U] 14.5 Makes
Page 19 and 20: Reading ASCII data [U] 24 Reading t
Page 21 and 22: See label definitions See the value
Page 23 and 24: generate; replace [R] generate Gene
Page 25 and 26: 10.2. Selections Selecting observat
Page 27 and 28: 10.6. Combining files [U] 25 Append
Page 29 and 30: 11. Description and analysis This s
Page 31 and 32: tabi [R] tabulate tabi is an 'immed
Page 33 and 34: ttest [R] ttest T-test for comparis
Page 35 and 36: 12.2. Logistic regression logistic
Page 37 and 38: . summarize Variable | Obs Mean Std
Page 39 and 40: poisson [R] poisson The stsplit.can
Page 41 and 42: 14.2. The anatomy of graphs Figure
Page 43 and 44: Ticks, labels and gridlines Stata s
Page 45 and 46: The default connect-style is a stra
Page 47 and 48: In bar graphs the x-axis is categor
Page 49 and 50: twoway connected; twoway rcap Mean
Page 51 and 52: twoway dropline Patient number 20 1
Page 53 and 54: graph matrix 40 30 20 10 250 200 15
Page 55 and 56: Select Enhanced Metafile (EMF) or W
Page 57 and 58: 15.2. String variables [U] 15.4; [U
Page 59 and 60: 15.3. Dates. Danish CPR numbers Dat
Page 61 and 62:
15.4. Random samples, simulations R
Page 63 and 64:
15.6. Sample size and study power s
Page 65 and 66:
15.8. Exchange of data with other p
Page 67 and 68:
16. Do-file examples Here follow sh
Page 69 and 70:
Appendix 1 Purchasing Stata and man
Page 71 and 72:
Variable names can have up to 8 cha
Page 73 and 74:
Index A ado-files .................
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