Datetime
A warning about data input
SPSS tries to be clever about reading data.
Under the format TIME, all of these are read in as "01:02", even though the format is a minimum of 5-wide:
"1:2"
"01 2"
"01:02"
Under the format DATE, all of these are read in as "28-OCT-90":
"28-OCT-90"
"28/10/1990"
"28.OCT.90"
"28 October, 1990"
Datetime formats
Format |
Appears as... |
Note |
DATETIME20 |
dd-MMM-yyyy hh:mm:ss |
MMM is as JAN, not 001 |
DATETIME18 |
dd-MMM-yyyy hh:mm |
MMM is as JAN, not 001 |
DATE11 |
dd-MMM-yyyy |
MMM is as JAN, not 001 |
DATE7 |
dd-MMM-yy |
MMM is as JAN, not 001 |
TIME8 |
hh:mm:ss |
|
TIME5 |
hh:mm |
|
ADATE10 |
mm/dd/yyyy |
|
ADATE8 |
mm/dd/yy |
|
EDATE10 |
dd.mm.yyyy |
|
EDATE8 |
dd.mm.yy |
|
Numerics
Formats only truncate the displayed value, or the value translated into data files. SPSS always retains data to original precision.
Given 123.45...
Format |
Using... |
Appears as... |
Fw |
F8 |
123 |
Fw.d |
F8.1 |
123.4 |
Nw |
N8 |
00000123 |
Nw.d |
N8.1 |
000123.4 |
Strings
String variables are only formatted to a length. The format is specified as AN where N is the width.