Practical and Efficient SAS Programming

Chapter 3: The Operating System

Introduction

Checking the Operating System

Running Operating System Commands

Using the X Statement

Using the SYSTEM() Function

Using a FILENAME Pipe

Working with the File System

Creating and Deleting Directories

Working with Files

Reading and Writing External Files

Using the $VARYING. Format and Informat

Using the FILEVAR= Option

Reading Date and Time Values

Creating a CSV File from a Data Table

Reading a CSV File with Embedded Line Feeds

Introduction

In a SAS program, you sometimes need to access the operating system (OS) to run system commands and to access the file system. Reading data from external files is usually a requirement in a SAS application; you have to get the data into tables before you can analyze ...