topic Re: sorting by date in SAS Programming

sorting by date

SR11 — Mon, 07 Sep 2020 01:11:58 GMT

I used previously proc sort statement by Date in a similar type of data. And it worked.

But now, I want to sort my new data by date. But the code is not working.

Data I have:

ID Med Date

1 A 7/8/2016

1 B 9/8/2019

1 F 10/11/2014

2 R 7/6/2015

2 E 6/8/2011

3 F 12/25/2012

3 F 11/10/2018

3 G 12/18/2010

4 B 4/5/2016

Data I want:

ID Med Date

3 G 12/18/2010

2 E 6/8/2011

3 F 12/25/2012

1 F 10/11/2014

2 R 7/6/2015

4 B 4/5/2016

1 A 7/8/2016

3 F 11/10/2018

1 B 9/8/2019

Thank you for your time.

Re: sorting by date

SASKiwi — Mon, 07 Sep 2020 01:17:38 GMT

@SR11 - Check the type of variable Date is. If it is character then sorting will not be in chronological order. You need to ensure Date is stored as a numeric to sort correctly.

Re: sorting by date

SR11 — Mon, 07 Sep 2020 01:51:13 GMT

Could you please tell me how can I check that?

Re: sorting by date

SASKiwi — Mon, 07 Sep 2020 02:01:45 GMT

Run this code for your dataset (replace MyDatasetName with your one) and it will tell you the type of your variables:

proc contents data = MyDatasetName;
run;

Re: sorting by date

SR11 — Mon, 07 Sep 2020 02:39:17 GMT

Thanks for the code.

Yes, this is a character variable. Could you please tell me how can I change it to a numerical variable? or any other way to sort the data by date?

Re: sorting by date

SASKiwi — Mon, 07 Sep 2020 03:03:58 GMT

@SR11 - you should convert the character date to a proper SAS date using the INPUT function:

Date_Num = input(date, mmddyy10.);
format Date_Num mmddyy10.;

Re: sorting by date

ballardw — Mon, 07 Sep 2020 18:57:12 GMT

https://communities.sas.com/t5/SAS-Communities-Library/Working-with-Dates-and-Times-in-SAS-Tutorial/ta-p/424354 has a PDF with much information about dates.

Re: sorting by date

SR11 — Wed, 09 Sep 2020 04:50:50 GMT

Thank you for sharing this information.

Re: sorting by date

SR11 — Wed, 09 Sep 2020 04:51:29 GMT

Thank you very much. it worked.