topic char dates in SAS Programming

char dates

VijayKumar — Wed, 16 Oct 2013 09:25:04 GMT

Hi,

I have a column in my table

Alphabetic List of Variables and Attributes

# Variable Type Len Format Informat

1 MNDATE Char 26 $26. $26.

Now when I try to do,

select (tab1.mndate - tab2.mndate ) as duration ...... ........ ...;

it says , cant subtract char...

What should I do to substract the dates.... ? ( I cannot change my column type...) Experts please help....

Re: char dates

Mit — Wed, 16 Oct 2013 10:44:00 GMT

Create a new variable of calendar date from the char date. Then do the calculations and then drop the calendar date.

data tab1;

set tab1;

day=substr(MINDATE,1,2);

month=substr(MINDATE,4,2);

year=substr(MINDATE,7,4);

run;

data tab1;

set tab1;

day1=day*1;

month1=month*1;

year1=year*1;

drop day year month;

run;

data want;

set tab1;

Date1=input(catx('/',day1,month1,year1),ddmmyy10.);

format Date1 ddmmyy10.;

drop date;

run;

Re: char dates

snoopy369 — Wed, 16 Oct 2013 14:06:30 GMT

select(input(tab1.mndate,MMDDYY10.) - input(tab2.mndate,MMDDYY10.)) ...

This assumes that is the correct informat; you may need a different one, or even a datetime, in which case you would need datepart(input... ) - datepart(input...) if you want days not seconds.

Re: char dates

Jagadishkatam — Wed, 16 Oct 2013 14:31:25 GMT

Hi Vijay,

As per the proc content screenshot, we believe the date is in character format. In order to perform the calculation on the date, we need to convert the date to numeric, so we need to read the date in numeric format, you can use the informat anydtdte. to read the date converting it to sas date value on which you can perform the calculation.

The interesting thing about this informat anydtdte. is that it can read any type of date whether mmddyy or ddmmyy or any other.

you can use it in the following way similar to snoopy369, just change the format

select(input(tab1.mndate,anydtdte.) - input(tab2.mndate,anydtdte.)) ...

Hope this works.

Thanks,

Jagadish