SPSS® 12.0 Command Syntax Reference

46 Universals
• When two strings are compared, the case in which they are entered is significant. The
LOWER and UPCASE functions are useful for making comparisons of strings regardless
of case.
• For certain functions (for example, MIN, MAX, ANY, and RANGE), the outcome will be
affected by case and by whether the string includes numbers or special characters. The
character set in use varies by system. With the ASCII character set, lower case follows
upper case in the sort order. Therefore, if NAME1 is in upper case and NAME2 is in lower
case, MIN(NAME1,NAME2) will return NAME1 as the minimum. The reverse is true with
the EBCDIC character set, which sorts lower case before upper case.
CONCAT(arg list) Concatenate the arguments into a string. String variables and strings can
be intermixed as arguments. For example, CONCAT(A,’**’) creates the
string ABCD** for a case with the value ABCD for the string variable A.
LOWER(arg) Convert upper case to lower case. All other characters remain unchanged.
The argument can be a string variable or value. For example,
LOWER(NAME1) returns charles if the value of NAME1 is CHARLES.
LPAD(a1, a2, a3) Left-pad. The variable a1 is left-padded up to the length specified by a2
using the optional single character a3 as the pad character. a2 must be a
positive integer from 1 to 255. The default pad character is a blank. For
example, LPAD(ALPHA1,10) adds four leading blanks to the target
variable if ALPHA1 has an A6 format. a3 can be any character enclosed
in apostrophes or any expression that yields a single character.
LTRIM(a1, a2) Left-trim. The character a2 is trimmed from the beginning of a1. For
example, LTRIM(ALPHA2,’0’) trims leading zeros from the variable
ALPHA2. a2 can be any character enclosed in apostrophes or any
expression that yields a single character. The default for a2 is a blank.
RPAD(a1, a2, a3) Right-pad. The variable a1 is right-padded up to the length of a2 using
the optional single character a3 as the pad character. a2 must be a
positive integer from 1 to 255. The default pad character is a blank. For
example, RPAD(ALPHA3,8,’*’) adds two trailing asterisks to the target
variable if ALPHA3 has an A6 format. a3 can be any character enclosed
in apostrophes or any expression that yields a single character.
RTRIM(a1, a2) Right-trim. The character a2 is trimmed from the end of a1. For example,
RTRIM(ALPHA4,’*’) trims trailing asterisks from variable ALPHA4.
a2 can be any character enclosed in apostrophes or any expression that
yields a single character. The default for a2 is a blank.
SUBSTR(a1, a2, a3) Substring. This function returns the substring within a1 beginning with
the position specified by a2 and optionally for a length of a3. a2 can be
a positive integer from 1 to the length of a1. a3, when added to a2, should
not exceed the length of a1. If a3 is not specified, the substring is returned
up to the end of a1. For example, if the variable ALPHA5 has an
A6 format, SUBSTR(ALPHA5,3) returns the last four characters of
ALPHA5. SUBSTR (ALPHA5,3,1) returns the third character of ALPHA5.
When used on the left side of an equals sign, the substring is replaced by
the string specified on the right side of the equals sign. The rest of the