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

Using Line Pointer Controls

You know that as SAS reads raw data values, it keeps track of its position with an input pointer. You have used column pointer controls and column specifications to determine the column placement of the input pointer.

Input Statements for Column Specifications and Column Pointer Controls

Column Specifications	input Name $ 1-12 Age 15-16 Gender $ 18;
Column Pointer Controls	input Name $12. @15 Age 2. @18 Gender $1.;

But you can also position the input pointer on a specific record by using a line pointer control in the INPUT statement.

INPUT Statement and Raw Data File Admit

input #2 Name $ 1-12 Age 15-16 Gender $ 18;

There are two types of line pointer controls.

• The forward ...