topic Re: Setting values for string variable into two categories in SAS Programming

Setting values for string variable into two categories

MariaMTM — Mon, 16 Apr 2018 18:03:03 GMT

New SAS user, editing an existing (very experienced) user's program. Long story short, when I run the code below, the 'Other' category isn't being printed out, it's just being coded as Frequency Missing. How can I get it to be a value in the frequency table?

Relevant coding bits:

Proc format;
VALUE $ZIPFMT ' 48021'='InCounty'
OTHER='OutCounty' ;
Data Students;
Set &student;
Format ZipCode $zipfmt.;

Title 'T16: Zip Code';
Proc Freq data=Students order=formatted;
Tables ZipCode;
run;
Title;

Thanks in advance

Re: Setting values for string variable into two categories

Reeza — Mon, 16 Apr 2018 18:04:39 GMT

Add missing to the FREQ statement and see if it shows up correctly.

Title 'T16: Zip Code';
Proc Freq data=Students order=formatted;
Tables ZipCode/missing;
run;
Title;

Re: Setting values for string variable into two categories

Astounding — Mon, 16 Apr 2018 18:10:39 GMT

@Reeza has the right idea. Prior to changing the code, however, you have to make a decision. What should happen if ZipCode has a missing value? Should it be counted in the "OutCounty" category, or should it display as missing (neither "InCounty" nor "OutCounty")?

The proposed solution places missing values in the "OutCounty" category.

Re: Setting values for string variable into two categories

MariaMTM — Mon, 16 Apr 2018 18:17:42 GMT

Thank you both so much. I've been trying to resolve this for hours. The code example provided works perfectly for me for this task, but what would I do differently if *did* want OutCounty distinct from missing values?

Re: Setting values for string variable into two categories

Astounding — Mon, 16 Apr 2018 18:25:56 GMT

You would have to change the format definition. It currently looks like this:

Proc format;

VALUE $ZIPFMT ' 48021'='InCounty'
OTHER='OutCounty' ;

You would need to add a category:

Proc format;

VALUE $ZIPFMT ' 48021'='InCounty'

' ' = 'Missing'
OTHER='OutCounty' ;

Make sure that OTHER= gets defined last.