R help - Nov 2003 - write.dta and handling labels

Hello,

 I need to write out a data matrix as a STATA 7 file and this happens perfectly
with write.dta(), except I cannot seem to export the labelnames to Stata.

 So far I have tried the following:
# X is the data matrix that is to be exported
attributes(X)$var.labels <- c("apple", "banana",
"cat")
write(X, filename = "text.dta", version = 7)

When i open the file in stata instead of the label names all I get are the
variable names, when i ask stata to "describe" the data.

I am hoping someone can suggest ways in which i can export the label names more
effectively!

thanks.

Arnab


-------------
Ph.D. Candidate
RAND Graduate School 
Santa Monica

Have you considered "write.table"? 

hope this helps.  spencer graves

Arnab mukherji wrote:
>Hello,
>
> I need to write out a data matrix as a STATA 7 file and this happens
perfectly with write.dta(), except I cannot seem to export the labelnames to
Stata.
>
> So far I have tried the following:
># X is the data matrix that is to be exported
>attributes(X)$var.labels <- c("apple", "banana",
"cat")
>write(X, filename = "text.dta", version = 7)
>
>When i open the file in stata instead of the label names all I get are the
variable names, when i ask stata to "describe" the data.
>
>I am hoping someone can suggest ways in which i can export the label names
more effectively!
>
>thanks.
>
>Arnab
>
>
>-------------
>Ph.D. Candidate
>RAND Graduate School 
>Santa Monica
>
>______________________________________________
>R-help at stat.math.ethz.ch mailing list
>https://www.stat.math.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help
>  
>

On Tue, 4 Nov 2003, Arnab mukherji wrote:
> Hello,
>
>  I need to write out a data matrix as a STATA 7 file and this happens
> perfectly with write.dta(), except I cannot seem to export the
> labelnames to Stata.
>
>  So far I have tried the following:
> # X is the data matrix that is to be exported
> attributes(X)$var.labels <- c("apple", "banana",
"cat")
> write(X, filename = "text.dta", version = 7)
>
It's not clear whether you want value labels or variable labels. Variable
labels don't get exported to stata, but factor levels do get exported as
value labels.

Eg

data(esoph)
write.dta(esoph, file="esoph.dta",version=7)

	-thomas