topic Matching variables in a row in New SAS User

Matching variables in a row

wubsy — Wed, 21 Jul 2021 22:12:34 GMT

Hello, I am looking for some help trying to match text between variables in the same row. Essentially, I am looking to see if a text string in one variable matches a string in several other variables. An example of my data is shown below. I want to see if the string in Var1 matches any of the strings in iVar1, iVar2, iVar3 with a flag variable by row. Is there a way to do this? It seems like it should be easy but I can't figure it out. Any help would be much appreciated, thank you for your time!

ID Var1 Var2 Var3 iVar1 iVar2 iVar3 var1_flag

1 Charlie Bravo Alpha Bravo Alpha Charlie Y

2 Alpha Charlie Alpha Charlie Y

3 Bravo Charlie N

4 Charlie Bravo Bravo Alpha Charlie Y

5 Alpha N

Re: Matching variables in a row

Reeza — Wed, 21 Jul 2021 22:17:21 GMT

You need to use two arrays here with the WHICHC function.

Here's a tutorial on using Arrays in SAS
https://stats.idre.ucla.edu/sas/seminars/sas-arrays/

data want;
set have;

var1_flag = whichc(var1, of iVar1-iVar3);

array _words(*) var1-var3;
arrays _search(*) ivar1-ivar3;
arrays _flags(*) var_flag1-var_flag3;

do i=1 to dim(_words);
_flags(i) = whichc(_words(i), of _search(*));
end;

run;

@wubsy wrote:

Hello, I am looking for some help trying to match text between variables in the same row. Essentially, I am looking to see if a text string in one variable matches a string in several other variables. An example of my data is shown below. I want to see if the string in Var1 matches any of the strings in iVar1, iVar2, iVar3 with a flag variable by row. Is there a way to do this? It seems like it should be easy but I can't figure it out. Any help would be much appreciated, thank you for your time!

ID Var1 Var2 Var3 iVar1 iVar2 iVar3 var1_flag

1 Charlie Bravo Alpha Bravo Alpha Charlie Y

2 Alpha Charlie Alpha Charlie Y

3 Bravo Charlie N

4 Charlie Bravo Bravo Alpha Charlie Y

5 Alpha N

Re: Matching variables in a row

Ksharp — Thu, 22 Jul 2021 12:07:58 GMT

Using 'IN' operator of array.

data have;
input  ID    ( Var1       Var2     Var3       iVar1      iVar2     iVar3 ) ($);   
cards;
1      Charlie    Bravo    Alpha     Bravo     Alpha    Charlie  
;

data want;
 set have;
 array x{*} $ ivar1-ivar3;
 if var1 in x then var1_flag='Y';
  else var1_flag='N';
run;