Importing data into Stata

[5forwards]

Hi everyone. I am struggling to import PAC data into Stata. I know that the files are comma delimited and use pipes as qualifiers but for some reason I always end up with a messy file. Has anyone had success in using  stata to import the data? 

Thanks!

[CJ Libassi]

Yeah, unfortunately because the Import Delimited Command from Stata automatically recognizes all delimiters, the commas in some of the PAC names will throw off the import. The key is to do a find and replace in the text file where you replace all pipes with quotes (Find: | Replace with: "). Because these files are so big, it was my experience that the find and replace actually takes a few minutes, and is fastest on computers with more memory. 

After you've done the find and replace it should be a fairly straightforward import. 

Hope this helps!

CJ 

[5forwards]

Worked perfectly, thanks!