topic Re: How to use a working cURL command in SAS in SAS Programming

How to use a working cURL command in SAS

DevinChellberg — Mon, 15 Mar 2021 20:26:39 GMT

I have a curl command that works in the command prompt that I need to get working in SAS 9.2. This is all translated from proc HTTP in 9.4 because some users at my company are still using the old version.

The command that works in the command prompt (with abc123 substituted in critical positions):

C:\Users\dc2\Downloads\curl.exe --location --request POST "https://example.com" -H "Authorization:Basic abc123==" -H "Content-Type:application/x-www-form-urlencoded" -H "Cookie:abc123=abc123" --data-urlencode "grant_type=refresh_token" --data-urlencode "refresh_token=abc123" > "C:\token.json"

In SAS it looks like:

data test;
	
	CURLText = 'C:\Users\dc2\Downloads\curl.exe --location --request POST "https://example.com" -H "Authorization:Basic abc123==" -H "Content-Type:application/x-www-form-urlencoded" -H "Cookie:abc123=abc123" --data-urlencode "grant_type=refresh_token" --data-urlencode "refresh_token=abc123" > "C:\token.json"';

	call symput ('CURLText', CURLText);
run;

filename req pipe %sysfunc(quote(&CURLText));

data _null_;
infile req missover lrecl= 32000;
input ;
file Response;
put _infile_;   
run;

Right now the error being stored in the local file is: Illegal character 'ﾠ' in header name. That error message goes away (and is replaced with an invalid request error) if I remove the colons from the header text.

I would appreciate any help getting this to work! Once I have it working in long form, I'll tackle storing some of the relevant bits in macro variables and referencing them within the filename statement.

Thanks!

Re: How to use a working cURL command in SAS

japelin — Tue, 16 Mar 2021 03:31:13 GMT

How about this.

Try adding two single quotes, one at the beginning and one at the end.

CURLText = '''C:\Users\dc2\Downloads\curl.exe ..... =abc123" > "C:\token.json"''';

Re: How to use a working cURL command in SAS

Kurt_Bremser — Tue, 16 Mar 2021 12:16:11 GMT

Use single quotes around the command:

call symput ('CURLText',quote(CURLText,"'"));

and no quoting in the FILENAME:

filename req pipe CURLText;

Re: How to use a working cURL command in SAS

ChrisNZ — Tue, 16 Mar 2021 06:19:28 GMT

What happens if you quote in

call symput ('CURLText', quote(trim(CURLText)));

rather than in the filename?

Re: How to use a working cURL command in SAS

Ksharp — Tue, 16 Mar 2021 11:33:36 GMT

Did you try X command ?

x 'C:\Users\dc2\Downloads\curl.exe --location --request POST "https://example.com" -H "Authorization:Basic abc123==" -H "Content-Type:application/x-www-form-urlencoded" -H "Cookie:abc123=abc123" --data-urlencode "grant_type=refresh_token" --data-urlencode "refresh_token=abc123" > "C:\token.json" ';

Re: How to use a working cURL command in SAS

DevinChellberg — Tue, 16 Mar 2021 12:11:54 GMT

That interpreted the outfile path as a single quote as part of the file type of the json (json'), returning an error of "The specified path is invalid" and not populating anything in the file.

Thanks for the suggestion!

Re: How to use a working cURL command in SAS

DevinChellberg — Tue, 16 Mar 2021 12:13:36 GMT

That returns the same error as my original code, "Illegal character ' ' in header name"

Thanks for the suggestion!

Re: How to use a working cURL command in SAS

DevinChellberg — Tue, 16 Mar 2021 12:14:27 GMT

No difference, unfortunately. Good idea to try it though!

Re: How to use a working cURL command in SAS

DevinChellberg — Tue, 16 Mar 2021 12:17:32 GMT

I have experimented with filename, x, %sysexec, call system. I've had the most luck with filename in terms of even getting error messages back.

When I run the above syntax with an x command, it doesn't appear to do anything at all: there is no output saved as the desired file location and the command prompt doesn't even flicker.

If that feels like something easier to fix, I'd love to hear any suggestions!

Re: How to use a working cURL command in SAS

ChrisNZ — Wed, 17 Mar 2021 02:11:31 GMT

Can you show us the log please? I get a feeling that maybe the code is fine, and it's the returned data that trips SAS.

Re: How to use a working cURL command in SAS

DevinChellberg — Wed, 17 Mar 2021 13:10:34 GMT

You must have been on to something. When I restarted SAS overnight, it just works now. I've spent 3 days trying as many combinations of quotes as I can think of, and today it just works (using the syntax in the original post).

I hate it, lol.

Thanks everyone for your help!