SPSSX Discussion

FW: Old portable file

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John F Hall

FW: Old portable file

Mark

That was quick!

His query only came in at midnight last night. Are we talking about the
same tape?

John
[hidden email]
www.surveyresearch.weebly.com

-----Original Message-----
From: SPSSX(r) Discussion [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of
Staffan Lindberg
Sent: 23 June 2011 23:58
To: [hidden email]
Subject: SV: Old portable file

Yes, I've look at this but the .por file is the only one on the tape. All
the others are system SPSSX-files created in the 80´s on the mainframe (IBM
360/370), operative system MVS, unclear what version. I've already tried in
various ways to read these even with the help on this list but failed.
Thought the .por file would be different. Anyhow, this give us some food for
thought. In 40-50 years will we still be able to read SPSS for Windows files
on old diskettes, tapes, hard drives or USB sticks?

Best and thanks again

Staffan Lindberg
Sweden

-----Ursprungligt meddelande-----
Från: David Marso [mailto:[hidden email]]
Skickat: den 23 juni 2011 22:11
Till: Staffan Lindberg
Ämne: Re: Old portable file

Hi Staffan,
You might see if there are other files on the tape which have some ancestral
relationship to the "por" file.
David

On Thu, Jun 23, 2011 at 4:02 PM, Staffan Lindberg
<[hidden email]> wrote:

> Thank you ever so much for trying, David. I got the file from an old
> dump on tapes from the mainframe. I'm beginning to suspect it was
> created on an old mainframe and actually is not in a SPSS for Windows
> format .I'm very grateful though that you gave it a try. It's pretty
> obvious, that it has quite a different structure than your example.
>
> Wishing you all the best
>
> Staffan Lindberg
> Sweden
>
> -----Ursprungligt meddelande-----
> Från: David Marso [mailto:[hidden email]]
> Skickat: den 23 juni 2011 20:30
> Till: Staffan Lindberg
> Ämne: Re: Old portable file
>
> Hi Staffan,
> This does not appear to be an SPSS portable file. It should be plain
> text and have 80 character record length. I created a POR file in
> SPSS 11.5 and you can see what it looks like.
> Do you have any record of where the file came from? It might be a
> standard old system file (.sav) but whatever host system has probably
> been unplugged long ago -It looks binary rather than text-.
> Sorry I could not be of further assistance.
> David
>
> P.S.
> You can see the rather obvious mapping logic within this simple file.
> The first part is a system specific header terminated by SPSSPORTA8/
> and the creation date... then follows the data dictionary and then the

data.

>
> data list free / a b c (3f1) alpha (a6).
> begin data
> 1 2 3 case1
> 4 5 6 case2
> 7 8 9 case3
> 2 3 4 case4
> 5 2 0 case5
> 6 3 5 case6
> end data.
> value labels
> a b c
> 1 "one" 2 "two" 3 "three" 4 "four" 5 "five" 6 "six" 7 "seven" 8
> "eight" 9 "missing".
> missing values all (9).
> variable labels
> a "Variable a"
> b "Variable b"
> c "Variable c".
> EXPORT OUTFILE "C:\Temp\SPSSPortableTest2.por" .
>
> ----------------
> ÁâÃÉÉ@â×ââ@×ÖÙã@ÆÉÓÅ@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ASCII SPSS PORT FILE
> 00000-0000-0000-0000--------------------!3#))0303300/240&),%0000000000
> 000000
> 0000
> 0200002'220'&)3000#000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
> 000000
> 0000
> 0000000000000000000000000123456789ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghij
> klmnop
> qrst
> uvwxyz
> .<(+0&[]!$*);^-/|,%_>?`:#@'="000000~000000000000000000000{}\0000000000
> 000
> 00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000SPSSPORTA8/201
> 106236
> /141
> 755112/SPSS for Microsoft Windows
> Relea44/5B/70/1/A5/1/0/5/1/0/CA/Variable
> a70/1 /B5/1/0/5/1/0/CA/Variable b70/1/C5/1/0/5/1/0/CA/Variable
> c76/5/ALPHA1/6/0/1/6/0/ C1/
> D3/1/A1/B1/C9/1/3/one2/3/two3/5/three4/4/four5/4/five6/3/six7/5/seven8
> /5/eig
> ht9/7/missingF1/2/3/5/case14/5/6/5/case27/8/9/5/case32/3/4/5/case45/2/
> 0/5/ca
> se56
> /3/5/5/case6ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ
> ZZZZZZ
> ZZZZ
>
>
> On Thu, Jun 23, 2011 at 1:06 PM, Staffan Lindberg
> <[hidden email]> wrote:
>> Hi David!
>>
>>
>>
>> Thank you ever so much for trying. Enclose the file.
>>
>>
>>
>> best
>>
>>
>>
>> Staffan Lindberg
>>
>> Sweden
>
>

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Albert-Jan Roskam

Re: FW: Old portable file

yes, old formats can be a nuisance: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=seeing-forever

Cheers!!
Albert-Jan

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
All right, but apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a fresh water system, and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

From: John F Hall <[hidden email]>
To: [hidden email]
Sent: Fri, June 24, 2011 5:00:14 PM
Subject: [SPSSX-L] FW: Old portable file

Mark

That was quick!

His query only came in at midnight last night. Are we talking about the
same tape?

John
[hidden email]
www.surveyresearch.weebly.com

-----Original Message-----
From: SPSSX(r) Discussion [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of
Staffan Lindberg
Sent: 23 June 2011 23:58
To: [hidden email]
Subject: SV: Old portable file

Yes, I've look at this but the .por file is the only one on the tape. All
the others are system SPSSX-files created in the 80´s on the mainframe (IBM
360/370), operative system MVS, unclear what version. I've already tried in
various ways to read these even with the help on this list but failed.
Thought the .por file would be different. Anyhow, this give us some food for
thought. In 40-50 years will we still be able to read SPSS for Windows files
on old diskettes, tapes, hard drives or USB sticks?

Best and thanks again

Staffan Lindberg
Sweden

-----Ursprungligt meddelande-----
Från: David Marso [mailto:[hidden email]]
Skickat: den 23 juni 2011 22:11
Till: Staffan Lindberg
Ämne: Re: Old portable file

Hi Staffan,
You might see if there are other files on the tape which have some ancestral
relationship to the "por" file.
David

On Thu, Jun 23, 2011 at 4:02 PM, Staffan Lindberg
<[hidden email]> wrote:

data.

Kubus, Jim

Automatic reply: FW: Old portable file

I will be out of the office until July 5th, and will respond to your email at that time. Please contact 734-998-8200 for any urgent matters.

Thanks,

Jim

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