st: Significant figures formats

[Roger Newson <roger.newson@kcl.ac.uk>]

Fellow Statalisters

I have been looking in -[U] 15.5 Formats: controlling how data are 
displayed-, but I cannot seem to find any formats for displaying data to k 
significant figures, except for the %w.de formats, which display data in 
the form x.ye-z. Ideally, if I have a data set with 1 observation per 
estimated parameter and data on confidence intervals and P-values, then I 
would like to be able to list the P-values to 2 significant figures, so 
that 4.5e-1 would be listed as
0.45
and 4.5e-2 would be listed as
0.045
and 4.5e-5 would be listed as
0.000045
This would display exactly the same information as the e-format, but would 
be more easy for my non-statistical colleagues to understand. However, I 
haven't found a way of automatng this in Stata, either with %w.df formats 
or with %w.dg formats. Is there a way of displaying data to k significant 
figures in Stata? Because, if not, it might be a good idea for an item on 
the wish list. In the mean time, I might try to write a Stata ado-file to 
convert e-format data to significant figures.

Best wishes (and thanks in advance)

Roger

--
Roger Newson
Lecturer in Medical Statistics
Department of Public Health Sciences
King's College London
5th Floor, Capital House
42 Weston Street
London SE1 3QD
United Kingdom

Tel: 020 7848 6648 International +44 20 7848 6648
Fax: 020 7848 6620 International +44 20 7848 6620
  or 020 7848 6605 International +44 20 7848 6605
Email: roger.newson@kcl.ac.uk
Website: http://www.kcl-phs.org.uk/rogernewson

Opinions expressed are those of the author, not the institution.

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