Referring to a list of variables in functions

[charlie wong]

Hello everyone
Just wondering if there is an easy way to refer to a group of many variables in functions such as max, min, etc. For example, when doing:

gen my_var = max(a1, a2, a3, ..., a9)

Is there any shortcut such as

gen my_var = max(a?)

so that I don't need to type all variables in the arguments for the function max() when all arguments are variables named in the fashion "a?".

Thank you very much.

[Clyde Schechter]

unab vbles: a?
local vbles: subinstr local vbles " " ", ", all
gen new = max(`vbles')

will do it, but unless your list of variables is really long, it's probably easier to just list them out.

[charlie wong]

Thank you very much Clyde.