topic Re: Adding a new numeric column with default value (null) to an existing dataset in SAS Programming

Adding a new numeric column with default value (null) to an existing dataset

jimmychoi — Wed, 08 Jan 2020 14:43:15 GMT

Hi,

To add a new numeric column with default value (null) to an existing dataset, which was imported using proc import, from xlsx file,

i thought this might work:

data alldeals2;	
	set alldeals;
	'% Acquired'n = .;
	'Debt Invested (in USD)'n = .;
	'Equity Invested (in USD)'n = .;
	'Bid Premium'n = .;
	'Per-share price'n = .;
	'Deal Summary'n = '';
	'Therapeutic Category'n = '';
	'Last Update'n = .;
run;

When I run the code, variables initialized with numeric null (.) are character types. why ?

I even tried this way:

'% Acquired'n = input('% Acquired'n, COMMA14.2);

but didn't work.

Please help me to make a new & null numeric variable.

Re: Adding a new numeric column with default value (null) to an existing dataset

PaigeMiller — Wed, 08 Jan 2020 14:46:58 GMT

Are these variables you are trying to create already in the data set ALLDEALS?

Re: Adding a new numeric column with default value (null) to an existing dataset

jimmychoi — Wed, 08 Jan 2020 21:14:33 GMT

No, they are all new

Re: Adding a new numeric column with default value (null) to an existing dataset

PaigeMiller — Wed, 08 Jan 2020 21:27:36 GMT

If I remove the SET ALLDEALS; from your code, then try creating one of your variables, what does PROC CONTENTS say? It says the variable is numeric. So the command SET ALLDEALS; must be interfering somehow.

data alldeals2;	
	'% Acquired'n = .;
run;

proc contents data=alldeals2;
run;

Alphabetic List of Variables and Attributes

#    Variable      Type    Len

1    % Acquired    Num       8

Re: Adding a new numeric column with default value (null) to an existing dataset

andreas_lds — Thu, 09 Jan 2020 06:27:43 GMT

First thing you should do: remove all special chars from all variable names and stick to the normal 26 letters, the underscore and numbers. Anything else must be moved to label, to maintain readable and maintainable code.