X-axis range question

[Artur Deguzman]

Hello all,

What should I do to solve the following problem?

I am using the xscale option to limit the range of a histogram, but it does not seem to work.

I read the discussion on the forum, and put one more option, "xla", as suggested in a previous discussion. It did not help.

Here is how I am generating the histogram:

histogram Duration, width(5) xscale(range(0 10)) xla(0 10)

Immediately after issuing the above, I get:

(bin=48548, start=0, width=5)

Then I get the following histogram, which is still off from what I want

[Clyde Schechter]

You cannot restrict the range of a graph axis in Stata through the xscale or xlabel options. You must do so by using an -if- qualifier in the main part of the command.

histogram Duration if inrange(Duration, 0, 10), width(5) xla(0 10)

If you read carefully, you will see that the -range()- suboption of -xscale- can be used to "expand range of axis [emphasis added]." It cannot be used to constrain the range.

[Nick Cox]

Is duration ever zero in your data? If not, then I would look at the distribution of log duration.

It seems that you have a very skewed distribution with about 15% in the lowest or next lowest bin (from 0 to 5 or from 5 to 10) and no other bin coming close.