On 3/25/2015 10:00 AM, ftr wrote:
Frans,
I don't understand why you don't change the variable width for
your string variables. This seems the most easiest way for
everyone.
Cheers,
ftr
If you have dozens of variables in dozens of files, it's not "easy"
to fix this problem.
I find this most often arises when I have used CSV or a Spreadsheet
to hold data for several different instances that later needs to be
integrated. For example, I've been involved in projects where data
was gathered each semester at a few schools. To later join that
data is a nightmare if there are many string variables.
Also, if you know that this is going to be an issue, you can do more
to avoid it. The annoying thing about this issue in SPSS (and PSPP)
is that you find out about the problem when the join fails. If you
don't know to avoid this, it can be maddening to repeatedly run join
and have to fix each issue individually.
-Alan
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