F3 as a shortcut key

[Konrad Zdeb]

I assigned simple command to F3 key with use of the:

global F3 `"use " "C:\filewithdata.dta" ", clear"'

Unfortuntaly, after pressing F3 search window below console appears. The same command works flawlessly for F4. It's rather annoying as I wanted to quickly switch between three data sets and use keys from F1 to F3. I'm running Stata/IC 13.1 on Windows 7.

[LPP85]

Hi Konrad,
what's the issue with using F1, F2 and F4, I don't get it
Thanks

[Kieran McCaul]

I think that the F3 key is used by many programs to bring up a search window. If I get into my editor, for example, and press F3, it runs Find next.
Similarly, in Stata, if you look at the Edit pull-down menu you'll see that F3 is assigned to Find Next.

Having said that, the User Guide has a section on Function Keys (U10.3, page 65) which has this example:

global F3 "list "

which clearly doesn't work.

So you may not be able to easily get around this. I did notice however, that if put a semi-colon at the end of the command, it acts as a carriage return, so you don't have to press Enter yourself:

global F4 `"use " "C:\filewithdata.dta" ", clear;"'

[Konrad Zdeb]

Kieran,

Thank you very much for your post, excellent suggestion with the ;, I will be happy to use it.

LPP85,

there is no major issue here, maybe except my pedanticism. I wanted to use keys from F1 to F3 as they would neatly correspond to three levels of spatial aggregation of my data that I often use. But of course, it's nothing important.