st: Factor variables

["Alistair Windsor (U of M)" <alistair.windsor@gmail.com>]

Dear Statalisters,

I am attempting to convert some of my user written programs to allow 
factor variables.

The first thing that I ran into is that you cannot use a varlist 
expanded by fvexpand in a foreach ... of varlist loop. Took me a while 
to work out that you can still iterate over the list by change your 
foreach .... of varlist to a foreach ... in loop. This switch should not 
cause problems since fvexpand expand ranges.

That this is necessary does not seem to be documented anywhere.

The next problem I have run into is that you cannot use the individual 
dummy variables 1.class as dependent variables.

My current solution is to fvexpand the list to get the individual 
1.class, 2.class, ..., and n.class dummies. This gives me a list that I 
can iterate over. Since these cannot be used as dependent variables for 
each var I produce a new var_clean using fvrevar.

Now I can regress var_clean but use var to label the results.

Am I missing something? Is there an easier way to do this?

I understand why i.class variables cannot be used as dependent variables 
but not why a specific interaction dummy 2.class variables cannot be 
used as dependent variables. I think that the standard check rejects 
them but should not.

Yours,

Alistair

--
--
Alistair Windsor
Assistant Professor
Department of Mathematical Sciences
380 Dunn Hall           Ph: 901-678-4431
University of Memphis   Fax: 901-678-2480
Memphis, TN 38152-3240
*
*   For searches and help try:
*   http://www.stata.com/help.cgi?search
*   http://www.stata.com/support/statalist/faq
*   http://www.ats.ucla.edu/stat/stata/