Hi Community,

I conducted a survey with LimeSurvey, but unfortunately I get an error message, when I import the results into SPSS (version 21). I can’t fix it and I would be glad if someone can help me maybe

I export with LimeSurvey the syntax file (.sps) and the data file (.dat) and stored on my hard drive. Then I opened the syntax file with SPSS in the unicode mode (default) and edit the path of the data. I then ran the command.

The data to be imported into SPSS, unfortunately the names of the variables, the value labels and the measured levels were not imported, even though I had it previously registered with LimeSurvey. I receive the following error message (in german), which is probably the cause:

> Warning. Command name: GET DATA
> (2281) The file has been identified internally as UTF-8 file. The
> ENCODING subcommand is ignored.

Original in german:
>Warnung. Befehlsname: GET DATA
>(2281) Die Datei wurde intern als UTF-8-Datei erkannt. Der
>Unterbefehl ENCODING wird ignoriert.

I suspect that this is related to the character encoding (set in SPSS under OPTIONS -> GENERAL -> CHARACTER ENCODING FOR DATA AND SYNTAX: Unicode). Or it’s not possible to export this data?

Does anyone know how I can fix this? I’m a student and only user of the software, without programming knowledge.

Thank you for your support

hi everyone,

I'm having the exact same problem - did you ever figure out a solution? Or anyone else maybe?

Hi,
well, I cannot reproduce the issue. (SPSS v.21) with exactly the same settings as Rico.
What you can do:
The first command in the *.sps file is: SET UNICODE=ON.
What happens, if you remove it?
Try to change the setting in OPTIONS -> GENERAL -> CHARACTER ENCODING FOR DATA AND SYNTAX

And, of course:
Have a look into your data file.
It's a plain ASCII file.
Is there something strange looking? Especially String variables?

Sorry, not to be able to help.
But of course you can provide your export files that we check.

Best regards
Joffm