Introduction to

Stata

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About
 STATA is modern and general command driven package for statistical
analyses, data management and graphics.

 STATA provides commands to analyze panel data (cross-sectional time-

series, longitudinal, repeated-measures, and correlated data), cross-
sectional data, time-series data, survival-time data, cohort study …

 STATA is user friendly.

 STATA has an extraordinary set of reference books.

 STATA has internet capabilities (installing new features, updating).

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Starting and stopping Stata
Use shortcut or taskbar icon.

If you have data in memory, and you've changed the data in

any way (even sorting), Stata won't let you quit without ei-
ther saving the data to a permanent file or clearing data
from memory. If you're sure you don't want to save the data
in memory, you can type: exit, clear to get out of Stata.

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Opening Stata data files
 Stata has its own format for data files
 extension *.dta
 Choose FileOpen
 Go to S:\...\auto.dta
Importing other file formats is possible

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Importing data
 Stata can also read tab-delimited ASCII text
files
 Most other software (e.g., Excel)
can write tab-delimited ASCII text files
 Let’s get data from Excel…

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Saving data
 “Preserve” saves only a temporary copy of the data
file.
 The original data file is unaffected.
 To save a permanent data file,
 Choose FileSave As…
 Navigate to your X: drive
 X: is where you should save things

 X: in the SIL is not the same as X: in the SRL

 Save as “my_example1.dta”

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4 windows
 Stata gives you 4 windows: Command, Results, Review, and
Variables. Command: type a command here and press
Enter
 Results: the results of your command are displayed here
 Review: each command you type is displayed here
 Click on a command to put it into the command window for editing
 Double-click on a command to execute it directly
 Variables: lists the variables in memory
 Click on a variable name to put it into the command window
 You can resize these 4 windows independently, and you can
resize the outer window as well. To save your window size
changes, click on Edit, Preferences, Save Preferences Set
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Review window: Results window:
Past commands. Output and past commands
Click to paste in Command window

Variables window:
List of variables in open data set. Command window:
Click to paste in Command window. Current command
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 Examining data

Move
selected Hide
column Delete
selected
Undo changes to the end selected
column Close
Sort by columns
since last “save”
selected or rows editor
“Save” column

Change
selected
value

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 Menu Bar
 Stata displays 8 drop-down menus across the top of the outer window: File
 Open: open a Stata data file (use)
 Save/Save as: save the Stata data in memory to disk
 Do: execute a do-file
 Filename: copy a filename to the command line
 Print: print log or graph
 Exit: quit Stata
 Edit
 Copy/Paste: copy text among the Command, Results, and Log windows
 Copy Table: copy table from Results window to another file
 Table copy options: what to do with table lines in Copy Table
 Data, Graphics, Statistics - build and run Stata commands from menus
 User - menus for user-supplied Stata commands (download from Internet)
 Window - bring a Stata window to the front
 Help - The Stata manual set in PDF format plus Stata command syntax and
keyword searches

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 Tool bar
 The buttons on the button bar are from left to right (equivalent
command is in bold): Open a Stata data file: use
 Save the Stata data in memory to disk: save
 Print a log or graph
 Open a log, or suspend/close an open log: log
 Open a new viewer window (to view Help or a log file)
 Bring the graph window to the front (if you've created a graph)
 Open a do-file
 Edit the data in memory: edit
 Browse the data in memory: browse
 Open the Variables Manager
 Scroll another page when --more-- is displayed: Space Bar
 Stop current command or do-file: Ctrl-Break
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Sources of help

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 Sources of help
 Help menu
 Command: almost the full reference manual for each Stata
command
 Search: keyword search of the manuals, technical bulletins, and
frequently asked questions
 and lots more!

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Basic Operations
 Entering Data

 Exploring Data

 Modifying Data

 Managing Data

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Entering Data
 Insheet: Read ASCII (text) data created by a spreadsheet (.csv files only)
 Input: Enter data from keyboard
 Describe: Describe contents of data in memory or on disk
 Save: Store the dataset currently in memory on disk in Stata data format
 Count: Show the number of observations
 List: List values of variables
 Clear: Clear the entire dataset and everything else

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Exploring data
 Describe: Describe a dataset
 List List the contents of a dataset
 Codebook: Detailed contents of a dataset
 Log: Create a log file
 Summarize: Descriptive statistics
 Tabstat: Table of descriptive statistics
 Table: Create a table of statistics
 Stem: Stem-and-leaf plot
 Graph: High resolution graphs
 Kdensity: Kernal density plot
 Sort: Sort observations in a dataset
 Histogram: Histogram for continuous and categorical variables
 Tabulate: One- and two-way frequency tables
 Correlate: Correlations
 Pwcorr: Pairwise correlations
 Type: Display an ASCII file

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Modifying Data
 label data: Apply a label to a data set
 Order: Order the variables in a data set
 label variable: Apply a label to a variable
 label define: Define a set of a labels for the levels of a categorical variable
 label values: Apply value labels to a variable
 List: Lists the observations
 Rename: Rename a variable
 Recode: Recode the values of a variable
 Notes: Apply notes to the data file
 Generate: Creates a new variable
 Replace: Replaces one value with another value
 Egen: Extended generate - has special functions that can be used when creating a new
variable

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Labeling variables
 To add a descriptive label to a variable
 DataLabelsLabel variable
 Add these labels to these variables:
 bwt : “Birth weight, in grams”
 smoke : “Did mother smoke during pregnancy?”

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 Labeling values
 Many variables are dummy variables
 two values: 0 and 1
 e.g., “Did the mother smoke?” Yes (1) or no (0).
 To add labels to dummy values
 DataLabelsLabel ValuesDefine or Modify Value
Labels
 Define label name: “dummy”
 Add values
 1 means “yes”
 0 means “no”
 Now tell Stata that smoke is a dummy variable
 DataLabelsLabel ValuesAssign value label to variable
 Look at smoke in the Data Editor
 and double-click it
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Generating and Recoding Variables
gen quality=0
recode quality 0=1 if VA==1 or
replace quality=1 if VA==1
gen

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 Creating a new variable
 Let’s create a dummy variable
 Data
Create or change variable
Create a new variable

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Managing Data
 Pwd: Show current directory (pwd=print working directory)
 dir or ls: Show files in current directory
 cd Change directory
 keep if: Keep observations if condition is met
 Keep: Keep variables (dropping others)
 Drop: Drop variables (keeping others)
 append using: Append a data file to current file
 Merge: Merge a data file with current file

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Syntax: Commands
Command Recommended Usage
Describe d Describe data in memory
generate gen Create new variables
graph graph Graph data
help h Call online help
list l List data
regress reg Linear regression
summarize sum Descriptive statistics
save save Save data in memory
sort sort Sort data
tabulate tab Tables of frequencies
use use Load data into memory
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Do file
 Do-files are created with the do-file editor or any other text editor. Any command which can be executed
from the command line can be placed in a do-file
 To open a do file editor: Window – Do-file Editor or Ctrl + 8
 set more off
 use hsb2, clear
 generate lang = read + write
 label variable lang "language score"
 tabulate lang
 tabulate lang female
 tabulate lang prog
 tabulate lang schtyp
 summarize lang, detail
 table female, contents(n lang mean lang sd lang)
 table prog, contents(n lang mean lang sd lang)
 table ses, contents(n lang mean lang sd lang)
 correlate lang math science socst
 regress lang math science female
 set more on

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Do file – cont.
Look at the commands in a do-file that contains:
 . type hsbbatch.do
To run the do-file.
 do hsbbatch
 From do file, choose Tools - Do

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