Naturally reading stuff in a language in which
you are not fluent can be difficult. (Your English
seems very good to me.)
I just note that this is pretty clearly a
problem in data management, so that is the
manual I would pick up. Then I skim
the list of comands and see
"split Split string variables into parts"
which was one of your questions. The other
part is a little more difficult to find
but the -split- help points to -egen-
because -egen, concat()- is in essence
the inverse of -split-.
Admittedly I am trying to re-create
the discovery process, as I am already
familiar with both of the commands in
question and know the answers in advance.
My advice remains the same. At some point
those who are using Stata daily -- and have
got past the absolute beginner stage -- would benefit
from just skimming the manuals to see what
is there. Quite often they would then discover
basic commands they need but have been missing.
I know most people think they are just too busy
to do this, but in the long run I think it
would save most users more time than it lost.
A very experienced Stata user who has been
with the program since Stata 1.0 once said
to me (paraphrased):
"I don't know how people learn Stata.
When it was very small you could master the
whole thing, and then you just learned extra
bits as each new version came out. But
I don't know how those coming to the program now
manage at all!"
So, how do people learn Stata? In some ways
it remains a mysterious question.
Nick
[email protected]
[email protected]
Thank you, Nick. You are currently saving my life.
>
> > You really would benefit from skimming the on-line
> > -help-, using -search- and browsing the manuals.
>
> I do extensive searches to find answers to my questions
> before posting any
> message here. However, it is worth of mentioning that the
> main motivation
> is the fact that, in some cases, I do not know keywords in English to
> search for. Try to imagine that you have only Stata manuals
> in French or
> Chinese. Finding specific topics, when you have no idea how
> to write that
> in those languages, may be a big challenge.
*
* For searches and help try:
* http://www.stata.com/support/faqs/res/findit.html
* http://www.stata.com/support/statalist/faq
* http://www.ats.ucla.edu/stat/stata/
