topic Re: separated correctly by a single commas & then a single space in SAS Programming

separated correctly by a single commas & then a single space

kalbo — Tue, 17 Aug 2021 12:29:36 GMT

Hi all I need to write code that checks that a variable names are separated correctly by a single commas & then a single space for example "DOMAIN, LBNAM, LBDAT".

So, for example, incorrect values I want to detect are:

DOMAIN , LBNAM, LBDAT

DOMAIN;LBNAM;LBDAT

DOMAIN,,LBNAM, LBDAT

DOMAIN LBNAM LBDAT

Thanks for your help

Re: separated correctly by a single commas & then a single space

ErikLund_Jensen — Tue, 17 Aug 2021 12:49:14 GMT

Hi @kalbo

Try this.

data a;
	s = 'DOMAIN , LBNAM, LBDAT'; output;
	s = 'DOMAIN;LBNAM;LBDAT'; output;
	s = 'DOMAIN,,LBNAM, LBDAT'; output;
	s = 'DOMAIN LBNAM LBDAT'; output;
run;
data b; set a;
	s2 = prxchange('s/(\w*)(\W*)(\w+)/$1, $3/',-1,trim(s));
run;

Re: separated correctly by a single commas & then a single space

kalbo — Tue, 17 Aug 2021 13:32:47 GMT

Hey thanks for your reply.

I tested the code and it fixes the issues. However, I wanted to detect when the issues occurred, rather than fix them. Would you be able to modify your code to do this?

thanks again.

Re: separated correctly by a single commas & then a single space

ErikLund_Jensen — Tue, 17 Aug 2021 13:43:06 GMT

Hi @kalbo

Just check if the string is changed, i.e. s not equal to s2. The following code only outputs incorrect strings, but the comparison result could be assigned to an Error variable instead.

data a;
	s = 'DOMAIN , LBNAM, LBDAT'; output;
	s = 'DOMAIN;LBNAM;LBDAT'; output;
	s = 'DOMAIN,,LBNAM, LBDAT'; output;
	s = 'DOMAIN LBNAM LBDAT'; output;
	s = 'DOMAIN, LBNAM, LBDAT'; output;
run;
data b (drop=s2); set a;
	s2 = prxchange('s/(\w*)(\W*)(\w+)/$1, $3/',-1,trim(s));
	if s ne s2 then output;
run;

Re: separated correctly by a single commas & then a single space

kalbo — Tue, 17 Aug 2021 13:58:56 GMT

ok great! thanks!