default value for auxiliary variables, if omitted?
Opened this issue · 2 comments
By now, derivescores crosswalk autonomously inserts auxiliary variables in case they are needed by a crosswalk, but not specified by the user.
These variables are filled with a default value of 0 (numeric, which has to be changed in order to solve #15 and #17). Anyways, we should discuss how a crosswalk can define a reasonable default value the routines should use.
Any suggestions on this, @kwenzig?
The equivalent to zero in the string-world would perhaps be an empty string (""), but "0" would be possible, too. And "0" is better visible, so why not use "0" for this use case?
I opt against the empty string ""; my original question was more on how to adjust the specification for crosswalks so that we can define the default value in each crosswalk directly. "0" is a good default for the ISCO --> EGP crosswalk's auxiliaries, but may be not for other crosswalks.
What do you think?