Re: st: What's new in v12 file format? [was: stattransfer]

[vwiggins@stata.com (Vince Wiggins, StataCorp)]

There have been two threads on the new .dta version for Stata 12.

Let me clarify what is true.

There is a new .dta format in Stata 12.  It is required because the new
business-date format, %tb, can place things into an existing field in
a dataset. Stata 11 processes that field but does not understand what
business dates might write there, and seeing them could cause Stata 11
to crash.

We never change the dataset version just because of a new release.  In
fact several releases of Stata use the same dataset formats.

In this case, it was possible for us to update Stata 11 to read the
Stata 12 dataset format by simply mapping the %tb format to another
format that Stata 11 understands.  We have done that, and we intended
to release an update to Stata 11 that reads Stata 12 datasets
concurrently with the release of Stata 12.  Those who updated their
Stata 11 would never have noticed the change in dataset format.  Stata
11 would have just read Stata 12 datasets.

That update was to be the final update to Stata 11.  At the last
minute, we encountered some additional changes that we wanted to make
to Stata 11 and so delayed the final update.  In retrospect, we caused
some unnecessary confusion and should not have delayed.

Regardless, we are in the process of building the final update to Stata
11.  That update will be able to read Stata 12 datasets, and we will
make it available in early September.


-- Vince 
   vwiggins@stata.com

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