Question

1) Is it possible to create a vector of strings in stata? 2) If yes, is it then possible to loop through the elements in this vector, performing commands on each element?

To create a single string in stata I know you do this:

    local x = "a string"

But I have about 200 data files I need to loop through, and they are not conveniently named with consecutive suffixes like “_2000” “_2001” “_2002” etc. In fact there is no rhyme or reason to the file names, but I do have a list of them which I could easily cut and paste into a string vector, and then call the elements of this vector one by one, as one might do in MATLAB.

Is there a way to do this in stata?

Answer 1

Sure — You just create a list using a typical local call. If you don’t put quotes around the whole thing your lists can be really long.

local mylist aaa bbb "cc c" dd ee ff 

Then you just use foreach.

foreach filename of local mylist {
  use `"`filename'"'
}

The double quotes (`" "') are used because one of the filenames has quotes around it because of the space. This is a touch faster than putting foreach filename in `mylist' { on the first line.

If you want to manipulate your list, see help macrolists.

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