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1.2. HELP
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Preferences are automatically saved when you quit Stata and are reloaded when
relaunched. However, if you rearrange Stata’s windows and alter the fonts and
colours, you can’t revert to any customised settings you had earlier. Get around
this by saving your settings to a named preference set via Stata 13.0 Preferences
Manage Preferences Save Preferences . Any changes you make thereafter do not affect the set; it remains untouched and can be reloaded unless you specifically
overwrite it.
Fool around a bit with the panes until they’re the width you’d
like, then save these preferences. Go back to Stata 13.0 Preferences
Manage Preferences , and you’ll see your newly saved window setup. Click
on it to restore it.
Stata 13.0 Preferences Manage Preferences Factory Window Settings restores the default view. This comes in handy if you’re using Stata on a public machine, and
someone before you already significantly altered the setup.
Current working directory
Look at Figure 1.1. The status bar at the base of the main window contains a
folder path, culminating with the current working directory, that is, the folder
that Stata is “in” – if you tell Stata to save anything this is where it will do
it; should you tell it to open something, here’s where it will look for it. Each
folder in the path is clickable – doing so is an easy way to change the working
directory, handy when you’re trying to find a dataset, do-file, whatever.
1.2
Help
Commands in Stata have syntax, options and prefixes which aren’t always identical. Unless you have a photographic memory, you’re unlikely to remember any
but the most commonly used commands, so don’t even bother. It’s far easier —
and more productive — to familiarise yourself early on with the Stata help files.
With that in mind, let’s make help our first command in Stata. Type the following into the Console:
help
You’ll see links to more information on basics, data management, statistics,
graphics and programming. Click
Basics
Utility commands [ . . .]
Commands everyone should know .2
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This is true for Stata 12, but Stata 13 now brings up “Advice on finding help” when help
alone is typed in the Console. “Commands everyone should know” can be found in chapter 27 of
the User Guide in Stata 13’s PDF documentation.