Re: st: Local Macros Containing Strings and Spaces

[Nick Cox <njcoxstata@gmail.com>]

Bottom line first. A space is just one character, so in principle
nothing different is needed.

Looking at your code

 forvalues i = 1/_N{
    foreach v of local dairy{
      replace grouping = "Dairy" if description == "`v'"
    }
    foreach m of local fruit{
      replace grouping = "Fruit" if description == "`m'"
    }
 }

the outer loop is totally unnecessary. Note also that nothing within
the outer loop does things differently referring to the current value
of `i'. Stata automatically loops over observations with syntax like
this.

You don't
spell out what "doesn't work" means, but Stata will object to the
literal "_N" any way as -forvalues- will not evaluate it for you.
Also, a loop over one value is not a problem, but superfluous.

A more subtle program is that

local dairy "Organic Eggs" "Nonfat Milk"

won't work as you want, as the outer " " get stripped as string delimiters.

Code like this.

 local dairy `" "Organic Eggs" "Nonfat Milk" "'
local fruit "Conventional Cherries"

generate grouping == ""

foreach v of local dairy{
      replace grouping = "Dairy" if description == "`v'"
}
replace grouping = "Fruit" if description == "`fruit'"

should work.

Nick

On Sat, Oct 6, 2012 at 7:48 PM, Erika Kociolek <ekociole@gmail.com> wrote:

> My question relates to strings in local macros with spaces.  I'll
> first relate what I am trying to do. I have a string variable that has
> spaces in it.  It looks something like this:
>
> description
> Organic Eggs
> Nonfat Milk
> Conventional Cherries
>
> For each observation, I would like to generate a new variable,
> grouping, based on the content of this description variable.  I.e.
>
> generate grouping = ""
> replace grouping = "Poultry/Dairy" if (description == "Organic Eggs" |
> description == "Nonfat Milk")
>
> However, I have so many description values that I would rather do
> something like:
>
> local dairy "Organic Eggs" "Nonfat Milk"
> local fruit "Conventional Cherries"
>
> generate grouping == ""
>
> forvalues i = 1/_N{
>    foreach v of local dairy{
>      replace grouping = "Dairy" if description == "`v'"
>    }
>    foreach m of local fruit{
>      replace grouping = "Fruit" if description == "`m'"
>    }
> }
>
> This does not work. In troubleshooting this problem, I noticed that
> when I write the command: display "`poultry'", Stata returns Organic
> EggsNonfat Milk. If I write the command: display `"`poultry'"' Stata
> returns Organic Eggs" "Nonfat Milk. My question is, how do I address
> strings with spaces in local macros?
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