Combine Categories Wizard: Overview

The Combine Categories wizard is a Virtual Variable Wizard that allows you to create a new virtual variable by taking an existing variable and grouping several codes together to form a new Summary variable.  When this variable is used the selection form allows you to either select the group (which will select all the codes that are grouped) or drill down from the group into the individual codes and select only a few of them.

This is very similar to the Zoom Variables that FastStats Designer can create, and which are created automatically for date variables.

However, unlike zoom variables you can combine the categories of an already combined summary variable.  This means you can have many layers of grouping.  This can be used so that a Postcode Sector variable can be grouped into Postcode District, Postcode Area and Region, etc.

On the Wizard tab click on the Combine Categories link to start the wizard - Summary Type