populating a variable

[Arthur Kramer]

I have two files of students who are identified in the files by unique
institutional id's-one file is a primary file containing all of the
students, the other file is made up of the students who did not contain data
in several fields on the primary file, but who do have data in those fields.
What I would like to do is "map" the data from the second file to the
analogous variables in the primary file.  The variable names, lengths, and
other qualities are the same on both fields.



Is there a way to map these data?  Merging permits the adding of cases and
adding other variables, but in this case the variables are the same.  Both
files are not completely identical, but the fields I want to map are.  Can
SPSS do this?



Arthur Kramer, Ph.D.

Director of Institutional Research

New Jersey City University

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[Maguin, Eugene]

Arthur,

Look at the update command. I think this will do what you need done. You
have a master file with some missing data for some records. You have a
second file (transaction file) that has some of the same records as the
master file and those records have valid data for some of the fields that
are missing in the master file. Both files have a student id number which is
your 'by' variable.

Gene Maguin

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[Arthur Kramer]

Gene,

That worked fine. Thanks.

Arthur Kramer, Ph.D.
Director of Institutional Research
New Jersey City University
Phone: [phone]
Fax: [phone]
-----Original Message-----
From: Gene Maguin [mailto:[hidden email]]
Sent: Thursday, May 01, 2008 10:53 AM
To: 'Arthur Kramer'; [hidden email]
Subject: RE: populating a variable

Arthur,

Look at the update command. I think this will do what you need done. You
have a master file with some missing data for some records. You have a
second file (transaction file) that has some of the same records as the
master file and those records have valid data for some of the fields that
are missing in the master file. Both files have a student id number which is
your 'by' variable.

Gene Maguin

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[hidden email] (not to SPSSX-L), with no body text except the
command. To leave the list, send the command
SIGNOFF SPSSX-L
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INFO REFCARD