st: destring id - for attnd matching in pscore

["Gauri Khanna" <gwkhanna@hotmail.com>]

Dear Statalist,

I am using -pscore- module to conduct matching using the nearest neighbour 
match with -attnd-. I would like to do some post-matching analysis and would 
like to restrict my data to the matched group. I looked up -help attnd- and 
ran the following command.

-attnd h11 wellsan v012 sexhhead v119 v136 v152 aware v730 v705 ///
rooms1to3 rooms4to5 propadult propwomen propmen v715 ///
v717 v714 v136v119 v715aware sh42 sh43 sh46 sh42sexhh ///
v730v119, pscore(pscorewellsan) comsup matchvar(scorewellsan) 
matchdta(scorewellsan) id(hhid) boot reps(50) dots logit-

1. However, when I look at my data, I have all mising values for my id 
variable "hhid". hhid = household id, is a string variable and which I have 
used in the command above so that I can subsequently use this identifier to 
merge with my original dataset and conduct the post-matching analysis.  I 
have listed "hhid" below so you can see what it looks like.

So I tried to destring my "hhid" variable but it gave the following error

- destring hhid, gen(IDmatch)-
hhid contains non-numeric characters; no generate


Then I used the -ignore- and -force- option but I got all missing values for 
"hhid". How can I convert it to a numeric value so that I can use it with 
-attnd-?

I will be grateful for your advice.

Sincerely,

Gauri

des hhid

             storage  display     value
variable name   type   format      label      variable label
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
hhid            str12  %12s

. list hhid

      +--------------+
      |         hhid |
      |--------------|
   1. |     2  1  66 |
   2. |     2  1  93 |
   3. |     2  1 111 |
   4. |     2  1 147 |
   5. |     2  1 174 |
      |--------------|
   6. |     2  1 201 |
   7. |     2  1 237 |
   8. |     2  1 255 |
   9. |     2  2  65 |
  10. |     2  2  95 |
      |--------------|
  11. |     2  2 130 |
  12. |     2  3  25 |
  13. |     2  3  55 |
  14. |     2  3  91 |
  15. |     2  3  97 |
      |--------------|

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