save12 and save13 assure that the same code shared across multiple computers will save Stata datasets in the same .dta format, regardless of the host computer's version of Stata. This facilitates collaborations between computers using different versions of Stata.

Stata's inability to open datasets created by newer versions of Stata is a common source of frustration in collaborations that share Stata datasets between computers with multiple versions of Stata.

There are various tools to transfer .dta files between multiple versions of Stata, ranging from saveold to use10/use12/use13 to Stat/Transfer. But there is no built-in Stata command that consistently saves datasets in the same format. Code that uses save or saveold will save to a different format depending on which version of Stata is running the code.

save12 and save13 always save datasets to the same .dta format, no matter which version of Stata is running them. There are various scenarios where this is useful:

• Suppose one collaborator has Stata 12, another has Stata 14, and they share a common code base and datasets.
  • If the code is written using saveold, version(12), the code won't run in Stata 12.
  • If the code is written using save, the datasets can't be read in Stata 12.
  • If the code is written using save12, both collaborators can run the code and read the resulting data.
• Suppose you're creating datasets to be published online, and wish to publish them in an older .dta format to maximize their accessibility. If the code is written using save12 or save13, it's guaranteed to produce the right .dta format no matter where the code is run.

save13 provides a consistent command to save datasets in Stata 13 format.

save13 has been tested to work in Stata 13 and Stata 14. It will continue to work correctly in future versions of Stata so long as they maintain the same saveold syntax as Stata 14, with an option of version(13).

save12 provides a consistent command to save datasets in Stata 12 format.

save12 has been tested to work in Stata 12, 13 and 14. It will continue to work correctly in future versions of Stata so long as they maintain the same saveold syntax as Stata 14, with an option of version(12).

Stata 11 can read datasets in Stata 12 format, but cannot write datasets in Stata 12 format.