Purpose: The purpose of this program is to simulate several card playing situations. The user can select the number of cards drawn and can also choose to play blackjack. This program is useful for demonstrating probability for playing card problems.
Download: You can download this program from within Stata by typing search cards (see How can I used the search command to search for programs and get additional help? for more information about using search).
Use of program: To use this program, type cards in the Stata command window. This will open a dialogue window with a number of buttons, a pull-down menu that allows the user to select the number of cards, and two radio-buttons to select sampling witha and without replacement.
The results of selections made in the dialogue window will be displayed in the results window the user clicks on any of the buttons. To exit the program, click on the "Done" button.
Examples: The following shows the output from clicking on the "Draw" button three times with the "w/o replacement" option.
[click "Draw"] 9 of Clubs King of Diamonds King of Spades 3 of Spades 8 of Clubs [click "Draw"] ACE of Diamonds King of Hearts 6 of Diamonds 10 of Clubs 4 of Diamonds [click "Draw"] 7 of Diamonds 6 of Spades 10 of Hearts Jack of Diamonds Jack of Spades
Next, we will select the "w/ replacement" option and click on the "wDraw" button three more time
[click "Draw"] 2 of Diamonds 2 of Spades 2 of Hearts 2 of Spades 3 of Hearts [click "Draw"] 6 of Spades Jack of Clubs Jack of Clubs King of Spades Jack of Hearts [click "Draw"] ACE of Spades ACE of Clubs 3 of Diamonds 10 of Diamonds 8 of Spades
Note that the 2 of Spades appears twice in the first hand of five cards and that the Jack of Clubs appears twice in the second hand
We can change the number of cards using the pull-down menu for "n = ". Let’s try it with 13 cards.
[click "Blackjack"] 2 of Clubs 6 of Clubs 3 of Hearts 9 of Hearts 10 of Hearts 2 of Hearts Jack of Diamonds 6 of Clubs 7 of Spades 5 of Diamonds 8 of Spades Jack of Diamonds 6 of Clubs [click "Blackjack"] 7 of Hearts Jack of Diamonds 6 of Clubs Queen of Clubs 9 of Clubs 2 of Spades 8 of Clubs 9 of Clubs 2 of Hearts 9 of Spades Jack of Spades 4 of Clubs 6 of Clubs
Now let’s play blackjack. Click on the "Blackjack" button to deal your hand. You may then choose to receive another card by clicking the "Hit Me" button. When you are staisfied with your hand click on the "Stand" button to see what the dealer’s hand is.
[click "Blackjack"] Blackjack You draw 4 of Clubs 9 of Spades Your total is 13 [click "Hit Me"] Your card is 3 of Clubs Your total is 16 [click "Stand"] Dealer draws ACE of Hearts Queen of Spades Dealer's total is 21 Dealer wins