xtile quantile limits

[Hagen Ebersbach]

Dear all,

When using

xtile CAT_VAR = CONT_VAR, nq(5)

I get a nice new categorical variable with numbers in 1,..., 5 according to their quintile in the continuous variable. I am, however, also interested in seeing the quintile limits that must have been used by xtile to slot each observation into its according bin.
Can anyone help me in how to print those limits?

Thank you for your support,
best wishes,
Hagen

[Nick Cox]

Some technique:

. sysuse auto, clear
(1978 Automobile Data)

. xtile bin5=mpg, nq(5)

. _pctile mpg, nq(5)

. ret li

scalars:
                 r(r1) =  17
                 r(r2) =  19
                 r(r3) =  22
                 r(r4) =  25

. tabstat mpg, by(bin5) s(n min max)

Summary for variables: mpg
     by categories of: bin5 (5 quantiles of mpg)

    bin5 |         N       min       max
---------+------------------------------
       1 |        18        12        17
       2 |        17        18        19
       3 |        13        20        22
       4 |        12        23        25
       5 |        14        26        41
---------+------------------------------
   Total |        74        12        41
----------------------------------------

[Hagen Ebersbach]

ah, great, thanks! I should have figured that out by myself