topic Re: Use a different compression scheme to make the file readable for Tableau in SAS Programming

Use a different compression scheme to make the file readable for Tableau

KimLeBouton — Tue, 13 Jul 2021 21:02:24 GMT

I have a user that has moved to Tableau Desktop 2020.1 and can no longer read a compressed SAS dataset.

Note: As of version 2020.1, Tableau no longer supports statistical files compressed with SASYZCR2. Use a different compression scheme to make the file readable for Tableau.

Has anyone found a workaround? For the short-term, the SAS user removed the default compression, but that isn't a great long-term solution.

Thanks in advance for any information that you can provide. The user prefers to Tableau tool for connection versus and ODBC/OLE/JDBC connection through a SAS/Access tool and SAS driver.

Re: Use a different compression scheme to make the file readable for Tableau

Tom — Tue, 13 Jul 2021 21:13:22 GMT

The message from Tablaau is a little cryptic for normal SAS users. I think they are talking about BINARY compression option.

Try creating the SAS datasets using the the COMPRESS=YES (alias COMPRESS=CHAR) option instead.

Re: Use a different compression scheme to make the file readable for Tableau

ChrisNZ — Wed, 14 Jul 2021 05:15:59 GMT

RDC compression (SASYZCR2) is called binary compression in SAS programs, and RLE compression (SASYZCRL) is called character compression in programs.

If Tableau stopped supporting RDC compression the question should be directed at them.

In the meantime try RLE compression as suggested: option compress=char;

Re: Use a different compression scheme to make the file readable for Tableau

KimLeBouton — Thu, 15 Jul 2021 23:26:58 GMT

Thank you for this clarification.

Compression=char was used and we still got the error message.

We will reach out to Tableau.

Kim