Creating Custom Dialogs

You can create custom dialogs for generating command syntax. This allows you to create your own version of a dialog for a built-in IBM® SPSS® Statistics procedure, a user interface for an extension command, or a user interface for any set of command syntax that you might want to parameterize based on user input.

Building a custom dialog involves the following steps:

  1. Specify the properties of the dialog itself, such as a new menu item for the dialog within the IBM SPSS Statistics menus.
  2. Specify the controls, such as source and target variable lists, that make up the dialog and any sub-dialogs.
  3. Create the syntax template that specifies the command syntax to be generated by the dialog.

Once you have completed the specifications for the dialog you can install it and begin using it. You can also save it to an external file so that you can share it with other users.

As an example, we will create a version of the built-in One-Way ANOVA dialog (from the Analyze>Compare Means menu) without the Contrasts and Post Hoc Multiple Comparisons sub-dialogs. This example requires the Statistics Base option.

The Options sub-dialog will contain all of the settings available with the built-in dialog except for the Means plot check box.

The dialog will generate command syntax like that shown here.

ONEWAY var1 var2 BY factor
  /STATISTICS DESCRIPTIVES BROWNFORSYTHE
  /MISSING ANALYSIS.

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