Download pdf guide - VSN International

4 Data file preparation 43below). Important points to note are as follows:• files prepared in Excel must be converted to comma or tab-delimited form.• blank lines are ignored,• column headings, field labels or comments may be present at the top of thefile provided that the !skip qualifier (Table 5.2) is used to skip over them,• NA,* and . are treated as coding for missing values in free format data files;– if missing values are coded with a unique data value (for example, 0 or -9),use !M to flag them as missing or !D to drop the data record containingthem (see Table 5.1),• comma delimited files whose file name ends in .csv or for which the !CSVqualifier is set recognise empty fields as missing values,– a line beginning with a comma implies a preceding missing value,– consecutive commas imply a missing value,– a line ending with a comma implies a trailing missing value,– if the filename does not end in .csv or the !CSV qualifier is not set, commasare treated as white space,NewNew• characters following # on a line are ignored so this character may not be usedin alphanumeric fields,• blank spaces, tabs and commas must not be used (embedded) in alphanumericfields unless the label is enclosed in quotes, for example, the name WillowCreek would need to be appear in the data file as ‘Willow Creek’ to avoiderror,• the $ symbol must not be used in the data file,• alphanumeric fields have a default size of 16 characters. Use the !LL qualifierto extend the size of factor labels stored.• extra data fields on a line are ignored,• if there are fewer data items on a line than ASReml expects the remainder aretaken from the following line(s) except in .csv files were they are taken asmissing. If you end up with half the number of records you expected, this isprobably the reason,• all lines beginning with ! followed by a blank are copied to the .asr file ascomments for the output; their contents are ignored,• a data file line may not exceed 2000 characters; if the data fields will not fit in2000 characters, put some on the next line.