topic Re: Forcing alignment of numeric-turned-character variables in SAS Programming

Forcing alignment of numeric-turned-character variables

VCM — Thu, 15 Feb 2018 12:59:19 GMT

I'm creating a table with counts + percentages in this format: nnn (nnn.n)

I want them to line up like this; numbers are made up, so no digs at my math skills ;-):

The percentages in the parentheses are coming out fine, but I can't force the counts (before the parentheses) to align properly once I change them to character.

C1 is the original numeric variable.

PUT3 = put(C1,3.);

STRIPPUT3 = strip(PUT3);

LEN = length(STRIPPUT3);

if LEN = 1 then addblanks = " "||compress(stripput3); **2 blanks added in front**;
if LEN = 2 then addblanks = " "||compress(stripput3); **1 blank added in front**;
if LEN = 3 then addblanks = compress(stripput3);

Even adding leading blanks doesn't align the character values the way the numeric values are. Similar logic applied to the percentages works beautifully.

This is driving me nuts; what am I missing? (Disclaimer: I have not had my coffee yet.)

VCM

Re: Forcing alignment of numeric-turned-character variables

Astounding — Thu, 15 Feb 2018 13:15:01 GMT

Perhaps:

addblanks = '(' || put3 || ')';

Or skip creating PUT3 entirely:

addblanks = '(' || put(c1, 3.) || ')';

Re: Forcing alignment of numeric-turned-character variables

VCM — Thu, 15 Feb 2018 13:21:10 GMT

These didn't work; the alignment of the characters in ADDBLANKS is still the same as above. 😞

Re: Forcing alignment of numeric-turned-character variables

Mo_NHS — Thu, 15 Feb 2018 13:35:07 GMT

you can either:

1. Use a leading zeros format or leading spaces (replaces the 0 with space):

data test;
/*create two value*/
c1=104;
c2=2;
/*add leading zeros*/
z1=c1;
z2=c2;
put1=put(c1,z8.);
put2=put(c2,z8.);
/*add leadin spaces*/
string1=tranwrd(put(c1,z8.),'0',' ');
string2=tranwrd(put(c2,z8.),'0',' ');
format  z1 z8.  z2 z8. ;
put _ALL_;
run;

Log

c1=104 c2=2 z1=00000104 z2=00000002 put1=00000104 put2=00000002 string1=1 4 string2=2 _ERROR_=0 _N_=1

Output:

if you want this field to be character with leading spaces instead of 0

2. use the alignment / justify option in proc print; please refer to this post.

Re: Forcing alignment of numeric-turned-character variables

Satish_Parida — Thu, 15 Feb 2018 13:36:43 GMT

Please clear us on
1. What your data should look like.
2. What your data looks like now.
3, Source data
4. Codes you have written.

Thank you.

Re: Forcing alignment of numeric-turned-character variables

RW9 — Thu, 15 Feb 2018 14:21:25 GMT

Would not the right function do what you want, assuming you always have 1 decimal place:

data want;
  length b $10.;
  a=0.1;
  b=cat("(",right(put(a,5.1)),")");
  output;
  a=123.1;
  b=cat("(",right(put(a,5.1)),")");
  output;
run;

Re: Forcing alignment of numeric-turned-character variables

Astounding — Thu, 15 Feb 2018 14:43:16 GMT

It worked for me (see sample program below).

If it's not working for you, you might have to show your log.

data test;

input c;

put3 = put(c, 3.);

addblanks = '(' || put3 || ')';

datalines;

104

;

proc print; run;

Re: Forcing alignment of numeric-turned-character variables

VCM — Thu, 15 Feb 2018 15:13:15 GMT

I'm not trying to align the numbers within the parentheses--those are coming out fine. I'm trying to align the numbers in front of the parentheses.

I thought that if you put(number,format.) to create a character variable, it would automatically left-align it (then all I would have to do is add leading blanks where needed), but that doesn't seem to be the case.

Re: Forcing alignment of numeric-turned-character variables

VCM — Thu, 15 Feb 2018 15:15:26 GMT

Thanks, but I'm not worried about the numbers in parentheses; I need to align the 3-digit/character number in front of the parentheses.

Re: Forcing alignment of numeric-turned-character variables

Astounding — Thu, 15 Feb 2018 15:18:57 GMT

No, the leading blanks are not removed. This should be fine:

put3 = put(c1, 3.);

PUT3 does contain leading blanks. If you don't see them, it would be related to how you are viewing (or printing) PUT3.

Re: Forcing alignment of numeric-turned-character variables

VCM — Thu, 15 Feb 2018 15:23:24 GMT

That's why I added
STRIPPUT3 = strip(PUT3);
LEN = length(STRIPPUT3);

You can see in the original post that STRIPPUT3 does left-align and the lengths are correct. But when I add 2 leading blanks to "3" and one leading blank to "82", you can see it still doesn't align correctly.

Re: Forcing alignment of numeric-turned-character variables

Astounding — Thu, 15 Feb 2018 15:31:27 GMT

Doesn't align correctly when? When you run a PROC PRINT? Using which font? When you run some other procedure? When you export the data to Excel? Do you have a log that shows how you got the non-aligned output?

Perhaps all you are missing is a format statement:

format put3 $char3.;

Re: Forcing alignment of numeric-turned-character variables

ballardw — Thu, 15 Feb 2018 22:30:15 GMT

Since the only thing that should worry about things like decimal alignment are people then the changing data values is NOT the way to approach this. In general the output report generators like Proc Print, Tabulate or Report will right align values which means decimal points won't align but any integer values will.

SAS supplies several formats that will align decimals on output such as BESTDw.p or Dw.p. Use one of these in printed or ODS output.

And many times your "failure" to force alignment of a character value will occur because of proportional fonts and the way they treat multiple spaces and the width of characters displaye

Re: Forcing alignment of numeric-turned-character variables

Mo_NHS — Thu, 15 Feb 2018 15:45:12 GMT

data test;
/*create two value*/
c1=104;
c2=2;
/*use right alignment*/
s1=right(put(c1,8.))||" (99.00)";
s2=right(put(c2,8.))||" (99.00)";
output;
/*create another row*/
c1=2;
c2=104;
s1=right(put(c1,8.))||" (99.00)";
s2=right(put(c2,8.))||" (99.00)";
output;
put _ALL_;
run;

Output: