Stata Data Formats

In the topic of data formats in Stata, the concept of display formats is of primary interest. Stata uses display formats to extend the type system.

Several commands have internal ideas about data formats.


Display Formats

Numeric Formats

The default display format for each numeric data type is as follows:

Type

Format

double

%10.0g

float

%9.0g

long

%12.0g

int

%8.0g

byte

%8.0g

The available numeric formats are e, f, and g. The general format (g) indicates that the number of decimal places should be shifted to improve readability. The fixed width format (f) indicates that a fixed number of decimal places should be shown. The scientific format (e) indicates that scientific notation should be used.

Value

With format %9.4g

With format %9.4f

With format %9.2e

3.14159

3.142

3.14

3.14e+00

314.159

314.2

314.16

3.14e+02

A c can be appended to any numeric format to indicate that commas should be shown.


Date and Datetime Formats

Dates and datetimes are numeric data with unit-specific display formats. These are:

Format

Unit

%tc

milliseconds ignoring leap seconds

%tC

milliseconds with leap seconds

%td

days

%tw

weeks

%tm

months

%tq

quarters

%th

half-years

%ty

years

These formats can be customized with specific components.

Component

Specification

Displays As

Century

CC

01-99

Century

cc

1-99

Year

YY

01-99

Year

yy

1-99

Day of year

JJJ

001-366

Day of year

jjj

1-366

Month

Mon

Jan-Dec

Month

Month

January-December

Month

mon

jan-dec

Month

month

january-december

Month

NN

01-12

Month

nn

1-12

Day

DD

01-31

Day

dd

1-31

Day of week

DAYNAME

Sunday-Saturday (aligned)

Day of week

Dayname

Sunday-Saturday (unaligned)

Day of week

Day

Sun-Sat

Day of week

Da

Su-Sa

Day of week

day

sun-sat

Day of week

da

su-sa

Half-year

h

1 or 2

Quarter

q

1-4

Week

WW

01-52

Week

ww

1-52

Hour

HH

00-23

Hour

Hh

00-12

Hour

hH

0-23

Hour

hh

0-12

Minute

MM

00-59

Minute

mm

0-59

Second

SS

00-60 (due to leap second)

Second

ss

0-60 (due to leap second)

Tenths

.s

.0-.9

Hundredths

.ss

.00-.99

Thousandths

.sss

.000-.999

AM/PM

am/pm

am or pm

AM/PM

a.m./p.m.

a.m. or p.m.

AM/PM

AM/PM

AM or PM

AM/PM

A.M./P.M.

A.M. or P.M.

Period

.

.

Comma

,

,

Colon

:

:

Hyphen

-

-

Space

 

 

Forward slash

/

/

Back slash

\

\

Literal character

!c

c

A plus sign (+) can optionally delimit components for human readability. It is ignored otherwise.


String Formats

Alignment is controlled by the presence or absence of a negative sign (-) ahead of the width. A string variable formatted as %-18s will be left-justified; with a format of %18s it would have been right-justified.


List

The list command resizes and reformats output to try and maximize accessibility. This involves automated truncation and alignment overriding display formats. For information on formatting the output of lists, see here.


CategoryRicottone

Stata/DataFormats (last edited 2023-06-13 22:34:07 by DominicRicottone)