Changing many variable labels at once

[Hans Zimmer]

Hello,

This is my first post as a Stata novice. I hope this post is not redundant.

I would like to change the labels of many variables at once. Specifically, I am looking to remove the identical prefix all the labels.
The analogue (for variable names) to what I am trying to do is renpfix.
Naturally, I have been looking to use a loop but I can only add "prefix"--not remove the existing prefix.

foreach v of var * {
local new : var label `v'
label var `v' "prefix: `new"
}

I would greatly appreciate any hint as to how to achieve this goal.
Thank you in advance.

[William Lisowski]

Here's an approach that might help.

// create sample data with prefixed variable labels
sysuse auto, clear
foreach v of var * {
local new : var label `v'
label var `v' "prefix: `new'"
}
describe
// remove the prefix
foreach v of var * {
local new : var label `v'
local newer : subinstr local new "prefix: " "" 
label var `v' "`newer'"
}
describe

[daniel klein]

See labvarch (part of labutil package) from the SSC.

Best
Daniel

[Hans Zimmer]

@William Lisowski:Thank you very much for your reply! This is the answer I was looking for--it works!

[Nathan E. Fosse]

Hi, Hans - I'll echo Daniel and recommend his nice labmm ado, which is available on the ssc archive.