TabDat User Guide

This user guide explains how TabDat behaves in everyday use: sessions, data loading, scripting, configuration, visualization, and estimation workflows.

• Sessions and the Data Model — The active relation, named tables, and panel metadata.
• Loading Data & Diagnostics — Supported formats, eager vs lazy execution, status, and doctor.
• Scripting & Automation — Reproducible .td scripts, seed/macro directives, JSON envelope mode, and machine discovery.
• Estimation Workflows — Linear, discrete, count, panel, IV, causal, Bayesian, ML, and post-estimation.
• Visualization & Artifacts — Plot commands, artifact directories, silent plotting, and format settings.
• SQL & Persistence — The sql escape hatch, named table creation, save, and export.
• Configuration — Startup precedence, .tabdat.toml, and XDG paths.