X Variables

may be selected by holding shift down while clicking on the icon.

Y Variables

may be selected by holding control down on PC's or option down on Macs while clicking on the icon.

Multiple Selection

may be accomplished by dragging a rectangle around the icons of interest.

Each computation typically gives a new icon (which can be doubleclicked to open) in the results folder.

Plots may be moved by dragging with the mouse.

Bar Charts

count the number of cases in a a (usually) non-numeric variable.

Boxplots

are produced by the same method as dotplots but add information such as the 25th and 75th percentiles, outliers, and the median.

Dotplots

involve selecting numeric data as y and categorical data as x.

Histograms

display numeric data in bars. Bar width can be adjusted by choosing Plot Scale from the hyperview menu (sidewise triangle) to the left of the title of the histogram window. to the number of cases

Lineplots

require the selection of one numeric variable and plot this against the case number (which starts at 1.)

Normal Prob Plots

plots the actual sorted values of the selected variable against a hypothetical normal distribution determined by the NScores function.

Piecharts

like barcharts count up the number of cases.

Rotating Plots

require the selection of 3 numeric variables. They may be set into continued motion by releasing the mouse while dragging.

Scatterplots

reuire the selection of numeric x and y variables. The hyperview menu includes the possibility of adding a least squares line of regression.

Creation

of a new variable is by means of choosing Blank Variable from the submenu New of the menu Data.

Cursors

can be either horizontal or vertical. A vertical cursor is for editing one entry in a variable. A horizontal cursor is for inserting a new case.

Selection of Cases

for copying or cutting a range of cases is accomplished by dragging horizontally or vertically.

Pressing shift on PC's while Clicking the Mouse

allows one to add an additional case to those already selected.

Return

advances to the next case (depending on preferences.) With a horizontal cursor, it does not automatically create an empty new case below. Just start typing if you want to create that new case.

Tab

advances to the next variable in the case if the sequence box (at the top of the right scroll bar for the variable) is active.

If you are just starting Data Desk and wish to start out by generating random or patterned data, an easy way to do this is to select enter data from keyboard, and then cancel from the dialog naming the new variable.

Generate Patterned Data

This command can be used to generate a sequence of case numbers (e.g. 1,2, ..., n), or other linearly spaced data.

Generate Random Numbers

Possibilities include distributions (uniform, normal, and Poisson), Bernoulli trials (sequences of 0's and 1's), and binomial experiments representing cumulative results of Bernoulli trials. In the dialog box here, the number of cases will be the number of rows (values) in each variable. By changing the number of variables requested from its typical default of 1, you can simultaneously do several simulations.

Creation

of layouts is by means of choosing Layout from the submenu New of the menu Data.

Text

is entered into a layout by typing it into a scratchpad and then either

1. selecting the text and using copy and paste or,
2. by dragging its icon into the layout.

Font size for the text can be selected from the hyperview menu (triangle to the left of the title) of the scratchpad.

Layouts

can be used to collect graphics, explanations, and computation results on one piece of paper.

Alt Print Screen

on a PC can place a copy of the DataDesk Desktop on the clipboard from which it can be pasted into MIcrosoft Paint and printed.

Text

for layouts is best entered in a scratchpad, selected, copied, and then pasted into the layout.

Calculation

can be performed in a scratchpad by entering any expression legal in a derived variable, selecting it, and then choosing Evaluate Derived Variable from the Manip menu. (So arithmetic expressions not involving variables are allowed here.)

Export

from the file menu produces by default a new ASCII tab delimited file. Before choosing export, select the variables you wish to export in the order you wish them to appear in the new file.

Import

creates a new relation from such a tab-delimited file. Variables may be dragged from one relation to another as long as both relations have the same number of cases.

Display and Hiding

can be accomplished by choosing Palettes from the Manip menu.

The Paintbrush and Lasso tools

can be used to conveniently select cases from a plot. By holding the shift key down, the cases you click on are added to previous selections rather than replacing them.

The Question Mark tool

can be used on a plot to find out the variable value which goes with the data point. For this to work, the variable window with the data you want to see when you click should be open, and the last variable selected.

Ranking

produces a new variable for each selected variable. The new variable records the position of each case in sorted order of the variable.

Sort on Y, Carry X's

creates a new relation in which the cases have been reordered by values of the variable chosen as y. All x variables selected are also copied and reordered in the new relation. A new variable holding the original case index of each new row also appears.

Sorting and Ranking Options

appear below Manipulation Options in the Manip menu.

Bigger Font Sizes

may be selected from the hyperview menu - a triangle just to the left of the window title.

Although menu based choices of selected icons may be used, derived variables are recorded textually. Doubleclicking on a derived variable created by a menu command will illustrate how the language of derived variables works.

Arithmetic

expressions like '(5*X[i] - 3*Y[i])/Mean(X)' are allowed.

If ... Then ... Else ...

is possible and illustrated in the string example below.

Sample Derived Variable

String

data can be generated using double quotiation marks, e.g.

		if assets > 10000 then
			"Big"
		else if assets > 2000 then
			"Medium"
		else
			"Small"

A string Variable_Name

(possibly within backquotes) may be used in a derived variable to refer to another. The value of this expression for each case will be the value of that case in the variable named by Variable_Name.

'Variable_Name[i]'

refers to the i'th case of the variable named by Variable_Name.

Working on a Portion of Your Data

may be accomplished by the following procedure:

• First select the cases you want to use. The lasso from the Tools menu under Modify is a convenient way to do this graphically.
• Choose Assign Selector from the Selection submenu of the Modify menu. This creates a new variable whose value on the cases you selected earlier is 1 and 0 otherwise. A corresponding button is also created.
• When you turn this button on (black color), many subsequent operations in DataDesk will only use the cases where this variable takes the value 1; i.e. the cases you selected.

Grouping data based on the value of a categorical variable

may be accomplished by the following procedure:

• Select the categorical variable as x.
• Select the other variables you wish to break up as y's.
• Now choose Split into Variables by Groups from the Manip menu. This will create subfolders, one subfolder for each value of the categorical variable. Within each subfolder will be the carried along y values for the cases whose categorical variable takes the value corresponding to that subfolder.

Sliders

are created from the New submenu of the Data menu.

have their ranges adjusted by the Plot Scale entry of the hyperview menu.

are used as a derived variable would be by referring to the name of the slider.

Normal

ZDistr(y), CumZDistr(y), InvCumZDistr(y).

t

CumTDistr(y), InvCumTDistr(y).

Chi Square

CumChiDistr(y), InvCumChiDistr(y).

Binomial

BinomDistr(y,n,p), CumBinomDistr(y,n,p), InvCumBinomDistr(y,n,p).

Poisson

PoisDistr(y,lambda), CumPoisDistr(y,lambda)

F

CumFDistr(y,df1,df2), InvCumFDistr(y,df1,df2).