Using the Layer Question option in mTAB™ is a powerful tool that allows you to add another dimension to your study and eliminates the necessity for multiple tab runs.  However, there are cases when a tab run will display numerous columns which total zero.  It would be more efficient for you if only the relevant responses with non-zero totals were displayed.

As shown (right), a typical analysis may entail problems encountered for each model purchased in a specific month.  As you can see, there are quite a few columns which total zero. 

Why not just Zero Suppress?
At first glance, it might appear that we could use mTAB™'s Zero Suppression feature to remove the necessary zero columns, but this is not the case.   Column Zero Suppression occurs only when the combination of the Layer and the column question's Sample Total responses are zero.   To illustrate using our example, the Brand A - Model 1 / January column would avoid suppression because other models were purchased in January (see Brand A - Model 2 for example) and Brand A - Model 1 was also purchased in other months.   What we require is the abilty for mTAB™ to look at the Layer columns within each of the column responses individually and to remove those responses that are zero within each column response.

Zero Suppress Layers
There is a feature available in mTAB™ that will accomplish this task.   To apply this feature, you will need to be on the Layer tab, where you will find a Zero Suppress Layers check box, that you will need to select (as seen below). 

After re-running the tab, you will see that the January column has been removed under ‘Brand A - Model 1’, since the total was zero (see below).   The February and March columns for this model have also been removed.   None of the columns under ‘Brand A – Model 2’ were removed because none of these columns had zero totals.   This feature will help remove the clutter of responses from your reports and only retain the relevant data.

Zero Suppress Layers