1990 Census Data for census blocks

1990 Census Data for census blocks are available in Summary Tape File 1B (STF1B).

To obtain data at other geographic levels, obtain the necessary geocode information from STF1B, and aggregate as required.

STF1B is not in 1990 Census LOOKUP, but it is on line and available as follows. The comments below apply also to other CD-ROMs that are in dBase format.

in UNIX:

If you are a programmer, look at the low-level DBUTIL routines, which read files in dBase format. STF1B and STF3B are in dBase format, but they are not included in the DBUTIL database which specifies CD-ROM locations at LBL. By imitating the DBUTIL implementation for other databases (e.g. STF3A), you may be able to obtain the data you need. If you are successful, LBL would be like to make your implementation available for public use.

in MS-DOS:

If you have a PC on the internet, install PC-NFS or a compatible substitute. Then access the online CDs with dBase, or GO and EXTRACT via the PC menu system. Warning: GO and EXTRACT require a great deal of memory in MS-DOS. You may need to tinker with config.sys and autoexec.bat to make GO and EXTRACT work in your PC. The same is true if you use a CD-ROM reader directly connected to your PC.

in either UNIX or MS-DOS:

If you have dBase or a compatible substitute running on an Internet computer with NFS access, you can run dBase directly on an NFS-mounted CD-ROM. It is not necessary to copy the data to your computer. Depending on your dBase implementation, you may need to use the NOUPDATE option to open a read-only file.
block.html 8/22/95
dwmerrill@lbl.gov