SAS Certification Prep Guide: Base Programming for SAS 9, Third Edition

Debugging a DATA Step

Diagnosing Errors in the Compilation Phase

Now that you know how a DATA step is processed, you can use that knowledge to correct errors. Editing and Debugging SAS Programs provided examples of errors that are detected during the compilation phase, including

• misspelled keywords and data set names
• unbalanced quotation marks
• invalid options.

During the compilation phase, SAS can interpret some syntax errors (such as the keyword DATA misspelled as DAAT). If it cannot interpret the error, SAS

• prints the word ERROR followed by an error message in the log
• compiles but does not execute the step where the error occurred, and prints the following message to warn you:

   NOTE: The SAS System stopped processing ...