Re: [Gretl-users] smpl --dummy syntax
On Sat, 25 Oct 2014, Sven Schreiber wrote:
just a small clarifying question:
smpl some_zero_one_series --dummy
and
smpl some_zero_one_series --restrict
are equivalent, right? For me they seem to give the same result, and
then I asked myself why the '--dummy' option exists at all. Am I missing
something?
It's true, the --dummy flag is technically redundant given the --restrict
flag. However, if I'm remembering right the --dummy option came first, so
removing it would have been backward incompatible.
Also, it might be considered user-friendly to retain the --dummy option
(pun somewhat intended), in that people who are unfamiliar with
programming concepts may not immediately see that if "foo" is an indicator
variable the conditions "foo" and "foo != 0" are functionally
identical.
(Or in other words, plain "foo" may not look like a "restriction" as
such.)
Allin