What version are you using? I have never encountered this. In my quick test, the following allows 01 or 1<enter> I trust you are not using quotes in the check file. If you legal values are consecutive, use RANGE. You can combine RANGE and LEGAL (for 1-5,9 for example)

A LEGAL 1 2 3 4 END END

RANGE 1-2 END

also works

Jamie Hockin Public Health Agency of Canada

epidata-list@lists.umanitoba.ca wrote:

Dear all,

I have a problem with numeric fields of more than one digit in length, e.g. ##. All legal values (and their value labels) for the variables in my questionnaire are precoded in the CHK file. Currently, if a legal value is defined as "1", the data entry program does not accept "01" and vv: if a legal value is defined as "01" the data entry program does not accept "1". The typists usually type without looking the whole time at the screen so they prefer the legal values to be precoded 01, 02, 03 etc because if they enter "1" they would need to press ENTER before the cursor moves to the next field (which they do not need to do if the length of the field is one digit). Precoding "01" etc initially seemed to work fine, but as soon as the record is saved, when the typist needs to return to the same record, e.g. to make a correction, the value "01" is reflected as "1" on the screen, and when passing through this field again, e.g. to move to a part that is further down in the questionnaire, an error message pops up: "illegal entry", and the typists believe they should change the "1" again into "01". This is at times quite a bit of a nuisance. I think that one possible solution (I have not tried this yet) could be to define for all digits under 10 both "1", "2", "3" as well as "01", "02", etc as legal values (with the same value labels), but I think it is not very elegant. Is there another solution?

PS. is there a command that can used in the CHK file to that after every entry the typist needs to press enter before the cursor moves to the next field?

Thanks a lot, Henriette

Dr Henrica A.F.M. (Henriette) Jansen Epidemiologist, WHO Multi-country Study Violence against Women Department of Gender, Women and Health

Tel direct: +41 22 791 3106 Fax direct: +41 22 791 1585 Mobile: +41 78 730 3035 E-mail: jansenh@who.int Website: http://www.who.int/gender/violence/multicountry/en/

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EpiData-list mailing list EpiData-list@lists.umanitoba.ca http://lists.umanitoba.ca/mailman/listinfo/epidata-list

1- is there a command that can used in the CHK file to that after every entry the typist needs to press enter before the cursor moves to the next field? Yes - Include a 'before file' block in your CHK file: BEFORE FILE CONFIRM END

The jump from a field to the next will systematically be performed after Enter in pressed, and not when the field is filled.

2- Yr problem regarding "01" vs "1": If the field is numeric, 01 is equal to 1, and thus is systematically simplified once the dataset is saved. The solution is to define the field as string, where the string 01 is different from the string 1. In this case, the code "01" will always remain "01". In case you need to perform calculations on it during analysis, it will be possible to define a new numeric field in analysis, and state that NewNumField = OldStringField.

I hope that this answers your problems.

Best regards, Gilles ______________________________________________ Gilles DELMAS Epidémiologiste Institut de Veille Sanitaire Dept. Maladies Infectieuses, Unité infections entériques, alimentaires et zoonoses 12 rue du Val d'Osne 94415 Saint-Maurice cedex - France + 33 1 41 79 67 27 g.delmas@invs.sante.fr ______________________________________________

-----Message d'origine----- De : epidata-list@lists.umanitoba.ca [mailto:epidata-list@lists.umanitoba.ca] Envoyé : mardi 1 août 2006 18:07 À : epidata-list@lists.umanitoba.ca Objet : [EpiData-list] EpiData Entry: issue with numeric fields and legalvalues

Dear all,

I have a problem with numeric fields of more than one digit in length, e.g. ##. All legal values (and their value labels) for the variables in my questionnaire are precoded in the CHK file. Currently, if a legal value is defined as "1", the data entry program does not accept "01" and vv: if a legal value is defined as "01" the data entry program does not accept "1". The typists usually type without looking the whole time at the screen so they prefer the legal values to be precoded 01, 02, 03 etc because if they enter "1" they would need to press ENTER before the cursor moves to the next field (which they do not need to do if the length of the field is one digit). Precoding "01" etc initially seemed to work fine, but as soon as the record is saved, when the typist needs to return to the same record, e.g. to make a correction, the value "01" is reflected as "1" on the screen, and when passing through this field again, e.g. to move to a part that is further down in the questionnaire, an error message pops up: "illegal entry", and the typists believe they should change the "1" again into "01". This is at times quite a bit of a nuisance. I think that one possible solution (I have not tried this yet) could be to define for all digits under 10 both "1", "2", "3" as well as "01", "02", etc as legal values (with the same value labels), but I think it is not very elegant. Is there another solution?

PS. is there a command that can used in the CHK file to that after every entry the typist needs to press enter before the cursor moves to the next field?

Thanks a lot, Henriette

Dr Henrica A.F.M. (Henriette) Jansen Epidemiologist, WHO Multi-country Study Violence against Women Department of Gender, Women and Health

Tel direct: +41 22 791 3106 Fax direct: +41 22 791 1585 Mobile: +41 78 730 3035 E-mail: jansenh@who.int Website: http://www.who.int/gender/violence/multicountry/en/