Re: NaN and missing values

[John W. Eaton]

On 23-Sep-1999, heberf <address@hidden> wrote:

| Yes, that would do it.  We would also need a load command which
| would interpret two data seperators (like TAB or commas for csv
| files) as a missing value.  Another issue is how will the matrix X
| appear when you type X at the prompt.  My recommendation would be
| that a missing value gets displayed as a .  on the screen.  This
| seems to be more or less standard.

In text data files, missing data could be represented as a single
`.'.  It seems reasonable to use that for display too.

What functions make sense for missing data?  Stats functions, I can
understand, but I don't think it makes sense to add a matrix with
missing data to a full matrix, for example.  Adding to matrices with
data missing in the same locations might make sense though.  What do
other systems (SAS, SPSS, S-plus, R, etc.) allow?

jwe



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