Finding your USDA variables

The USDA data on Unix (gromit) is documented so that all USDA group members can find things on their own.

"Mean" files in the data directories help make finding variables easy: these files contain the output from a proc means and proc contents of the entire data set.

For example:

/usda/core77/data/mean7731.lst

At a glance you can see the "n" for a variable as well as the minimum and maximum values.

Use the Unix grep command to find variables:

grep -i "sugar" mean*.lst | more

The "-i" says "look for upper and/or lowercase."

Since variable labels are in these files, "sugar" is bound to in the label of "added sugar."

"|" is a pipe, and "more" allows you to page through the results if longer than one screen's worth.