{"id":2358,"date":"2022-06-15T15:38:09","date_gmt":"2022-06-15T14:38:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.microdata.no\/?p=2358"},"modified":"2023-11-22T14:39:07","modified_gmt":"2023-11-22T13:39:07","slug":"now-you-can-restructure-datasets-from-wide-to-long-format","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.microdata.no\/en\/now-you-can-restructure-datasets-from-wide-to-long-format\/","title":{"rendered":"Now you can restructure datasets from wide to long format"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The new command reshape-to-panel<\/code> gives you the freedom to restructure your data to long-format, i.e. data where the information is organized downwards as observations \/ records.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

For statistics and analyses in microdata.no, datasets created through the command import<\/code> are normally used. These are data sets of the “wide” type, where information about all units in a population is structured horizontally at a variable level. The new reshape-to-panel<\/code> command now makes it possible to change the data structure to long-format (panel-format), where information about each unit (individual) is structured vertically at the observation \/ record level.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Variables that are measured over several times and that you want in long \/ panel format, must be named through reshape-to-panel<\/code> with specified prefixes that consist of the letters (prefix) from the original variable in the wide dataset. Other variables for which no prefix is \u200b\u200bspecified, typically information that is only measured once (gender, country of birth, etc), are automatically defined as fixed information and the values \u200b\u200bfor these are repeated for all sub-levels of each unit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The illustration below shows how the restructuring takes place under the hood. The example shows a wide-format dataset that contains the variables sivstand18-sivstand20, l\u00f8nn18-l\u00f8nn20, and kj\u00f8nn. Marital status (sivstand) and wage (l\u00f8nn) are thus measured for the years 2018-2020, while gender (kj\u00f8nn) is a fixed piece of information that is only measured once. The dataset is converted to long format using the command reshape-to-panel sivstand l\u00f8nn<\/code>. The variable date@panel is created automatically and contains the sublevel which in this case is a double-digit year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The reshape-to-panel<\/code> command has several uses:<\/p>\n\n\n\n