Re: st: Macros in -listtab- header: syntax error

["Roger B. Newson" <r.newson@imperial.ac.uk>]

Your quoted line

file write __00000B `"Grade 1`"' _n

appears (to me) to contain an unmatched ` character, immediately 
following the string "Grade 1". This may have originated from your line 
of code (in Step 3)

     local bgrades "`bgrades'Grade `j'`""t""'"

which seems to me to contain an unmatched ` character just after `j' and 
before "". I would expect this to cause some confusion somewhere, 
especially as your unmatched ` is just before a ", and the pair of 
characters looks like a left compound quote.

I hope this helps.

Best wishes

Roger

Roger B Newson BSc MSc DPhil
Lecturer in Medical Statistics
Respiratory Epidemiology and Public Health Group
National Heart and Lung Institute
Imperial College London
Royal Brompton Campus
Room 33, Emmanuel Kaye Building
1B Manresa Road
London SW3 6LR
UNITED KINGDOM
Tel: +44 (0)20 7352 8121 ext 3381
Fax: +44 (0)20 7351 8322
Email: r.newson@imperial.ac.uk
Web page: http://www.imperial.ac.uk/nhli/r.newson/
Departmental Web page:
http://www1.imperial.ac.uk/medicine/about/divisions/nhli/respiration/popgenetics/reph/

Opinions expressed are those of the author, not of the institution.

On 22/11/2012 17:26, Friedrich Huebler wrote:
> I use Stata 11.2 with Windows 7 and would like to create a
> tab-delimited text file similar to the one below.
>
> Level A                    Level B           Sum
> Grade 1  Grade 2  Grade 3  Grade 1  Grade 2
> 24.7     24.7     24.7     17.6     17.6     109.3
> 26.2     26.2     26.2     23.4     23.4     125.5
>
> For this purpose I use the -listtab- Stata add-on by Roger Newson (see
> -ssc d listtab-). The data is organized by level and grade, and the
> number of grades per level varies. To automate the creation of the
> table header I would like to use macros. When I include the macros in
> the -listtab- command, Stata aborts with an "invalid syntax" error. I
> don't know if this is due to the way I create the macros (e.g. the
> combination of single and double quotes) or if this is a problem with
> -listtab-.
>
> The problem can be demonstrated with the commands below. Step 1
> creates a meaningless test dataset that mimics the structure of my
> original data. Step 2 creates a tab-delimited text file in the desired
> format; here, the table header is specified manually in the -listtab-
> command. Step 3 is an attempt to automate the creation of the second
> row in the table header; the number of grades per level is unknown but
> is not greater than 8, hence the loop over the numbers 1 to 8. Step 4
> is the -listtab- command that fails with a syntax error.
>
> Please note that the macros "agrades" and "bgrades", shown with the
> -di- command at the end of Step 3, contain the same text as the table
> header in Step 2:
>
> Grade 1`t'Grade 2`t'Grade 3`t'Grade 1`t'Grade 2`t'
>
> -set trace on- reveals that the error occurs after the following line
> but I don't know how to interpret this information:
>
>    = file write __00000B `"Grade 1`"' _n
> invalid syntax
> r(198);
>
> Thank you for your help,
>
> Friedrich
>
>
> * Step 1: Test dataset
> sysuse auto, clear
> forval i = 1/3 {
>    gen a`i' = mpg if trunk<13
> }
> forval i = 4/5 {
>    gen b`i' = mpg if trunk>=13
> }
> collapse a1 - b5, by(foreign)
> egen sum = rowtotal(a1 - b5)
> format a1 - sum %5.1f
>
> * Step 2: -listtab- table without syntax error
> * Tab character for -listtab- header
> local t = char(9)
> * Tab-delimited text file
> #delimit ;
> listtab a1 - sum using "table1.txt",
>    head("Level A`t'`t'`t'Level B`t'`t'Sum"
>         "Grade 1`t'Grade 2`t'Grade 3`t'Grade 1`t'Grade 2`t'")
>    rstyle(tabdelim) replace
> ;
> #delimit cr
>
> * Step 3: Create entries for a and b variables in table header
> * Entry for a variables
> local agrades ""
> local j = 1
> forval i = 1/8 {
>    capture confirm variable a`i'
>    if !_rc {
>      local agrades "`agrades'Grade `j'`""t""'"
>      local j = `j' + 1
>    }
> }
> * Entry for b variables
> local bgrades ""
> local j = 1
> forval i = 1/8 {
>    capture confirm variable b`i'
>    if !_rc {
>      local bgrades "`bgrades'Grade `j'`""t""'"
>      local j = `j' + 1
>    }
> }
> * Show macros with table header entries
> di "`agrades'`bgrades'"
>
> * Step 4: -listtab- table with syntax error
> * Tab character for -listtab- header
> local t = char(9)
> * Tab-delimited text file
> #delimit ;
> listtab a1 - sum using "table2.txt",
>    head("Level A`t'`t'`t'Level B`t'`t'Sum"
>         "`agrades'`bgrades'")
>    rstyle(tabdelim) replace
> ;
> #delimit cr
> *
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*
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