topic Text length question? in SAS Programming

Text length question?

ybz12003 — Wed, 02 Mar 2022 15:39:27 GMT

Hello,

I would like to inquire about the length of the text ' EC1R0000' and 'ER3R00053', why did the result come back showing the same? I expect the first one is 8 and the second one is 9. Please help.

ID_cat=length(ID);

Re: Text length question?

ballardw — Wed, 02 Mar 2022 15:46:39 GMT

What is the reported length? If 9 it is because the first value has a leading space, assuming you have shown the correct definition of the value.

Length function will not count trailing blanks in a value but will count leading spaces. If you don't want that behavior then use LEFT or STRIP functions inside the length call: Length(left(somevar));

Re: Text length question?

sbxkoenk — Wed, 02 Mar 2022 15:48:53 GMT

remove the leading space in the first ID and it will be 8.
Use left function for example (to remove leading space).

data _NULL_;
ID=' EC1R0000'; ID_cat=length(ID); put ID_cat=; 
ID=' EC1R0000'; ID=left(ID); ID_cat=length(ID); put ID_cat=; 
ID='ER3R00053'; ID_cat=length(ID); put ID_cat=;
run;

Koen

Re: Text length question?

ybz12003 — Wed, 02 Mar 2022 15:49:53 GMT

I use strip function, they still show the same result.

Re: Text length question?

ybz12003 — Wed, 02 Mar 2022 15:52:01 GMT

Even with Strip function, both results show 9.

Re: Text length question?

ballardw — Wed, 02 Mar 2022 16:04:59 GMT

@ybz12003 wrote:
Even with Strip function, both results show 9.

Which means that the leading character is NOT a space character but something else. Possibly ASCII 255 (null character).

Try putting that variable with a $HEX format. Below is an example with the first character an ASCII 255, which displays in hex as A0 below, 31 is a 1, 32 is 2, 33 is 3, 34 is 4 and 20 is a space character

64   data _null_;
65     char = ' 1234 ';
66     put char $hex.;
67    run;

A03132333420

Strip and Left remove spaces, not other non-printing characters. Might even be a tab or similar.

Re: Text length question?

ybz12003 — Wed, 02 Mar 2022 16:10:26 GMT

I use strip and left, and I reverse their order. I still get the

ID_length=length(strip(left(caseID)));

same number, 9.

Re: Text length question?

ballardw — Wed, 02 Mar 2022 16:37:06 GMT

@ybz12003 wrote:

I use strip and left, and I reverse their order. I still get the
ID_length=length(strip(left(caseID)));
same number, 9.

PUT the value with HEX. You have something besides a space character.

Re: Text length question?

sbxkoenk — Wed, 02 Mar 2022 16:58:46 GMT

I agree with @ballardw : PUT the value with HEX. You have something besides a space character.

You can also check if you have non-printable characters with the NOTPRINT function.

NOTPRINT Function

Searches a character string for a nonprintable character, and returns the first position at which that character is found.

You can also compress with the 's' modifier:

compress function with 's' modifier.

s or S

adds space characters (blank, horizontal tab, vertical tab, carriage return, line feed, form feed, and NBSP ('A0'x, or 160 decimal ASCII) to the list of characters.

Cheers,

Koen

Re: Text length question?

ybz12003 — Thu, 03 Mar 2022 17:11:14 GMT

I got two different results with the same IDs 'EC1R00002' by running two different codes.
What are they meaning?
The first one showed "EC1R00002" with HEX value, "454331523030303032".
The second one showed "EC1R0000" with HEX value, "094543315230303030".

Re: Text length question?

Tom — Thu, 03 Mar 2022 19:05:56 GMT

So your second string has a TAB character in the front. To remove the tabs use COMPRESS() function. To convert to space use the TRANSLATE() function.

compress(ID,'09'x)
translate(ID,' ','09'x)

You might want to investigate how you got the TAB character into your variable. Note that the SAS editor in SAS/Studio has options to replace tabs with spaces when editing your program files. You should enable this so that your program files do not accidentally get populated with tab characters.

Re: Text length question?

ybz12003 — Thu, 03 Mar 2022 20:34:17 GMT

I will create another question in the community.