topic Using FILENAME in an 'if' statement in SAS Programming

Using FILENAME in an 'if' statement

WesBarris — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 18:54:16 GMT

I am trying to set a file reference according to how a macro variable is set. It appears as if SAS is ignoring my "if" blocks. Here is some code:

%LET DRIVE=M;

LIBNAME USEFILE "C:\";

data _null_;

if ("&DRIVE" = 'M') then do;

filename fileh 'this.txt';

end;

if ("&DRIVE" = 'S') then do;

filename fileh 'that.txt';

end;

data test; infile fileh;

input test;

run;

When I try to run this the SAS code tries to open "that.txt". Why?

Re: Using FILENAME in an 'if' statement

art297 — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 19:29:59 GMT

I would guess that the lines are executed before the if statements are seen. Will it work correctly if you wrap it in a macro and then change your if statements to %if statements?

Re: Using FILENAME in an 'if' statement

Tom — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 19:32:54 GMT

Use the FILENAME() function instead of the global filename statement.