topic convert a character field to a numeric field without resulting in an exponent in SAS Programming

convert a character field to a numeric field without resulting in an exponent

ChickenLittle — Fri, 01 Dec 2023 23:56:43 GMT

Hi,

I am trying to convert a character field to a numeric field without resulting in an exponent when the value is long.

Data:

obs Field1

1 123456789012345

Code:

data Example;
set RawData;
Field2 = input(Field1, 16.);
run;

Result:

obs Field2

1 1.23456E14

What I want as my result:

obs Field2

1 123456789012345

Re: convert a character field to a numeric field without resulting in an exponent

ballardw — Sat, 02 Dec 2023 00:05:32 GMT

If you input data with a 16. informat use a 16 wide FORMAT assigned to the value.

When you do not assign a format to a numeric value the default is BEST12. So stuffing 15 or 16 characters into 12 results in the Exponential display.

data Example;
Field2 = input('123456789012345', 16.);
format field2 best16.;
run;

Are these "numbers" actually a measurement or something that you will do arithmetic? If not leave them as character.

Re: convert a character field to a numeric field without resulting in an exponent

ChickenLittle — Sat, 02 Dec 2023 00:08:38 GMT

Thanks! And it is a key. But to spare me from modifying another original table, I'd rather just modify my table to match it.

Re: convert a character field to a numeric field without resulting in an exponent

ballardw — Sat, 02 Dec 2023 00:41:19 GMT

The format basically would have no impact on use such as joining a different table as I guess might be the use of something you call a key.

A somewhat silly example where one value is formatted as date to demonstrate that the format does not impact the join on the values.

data t1;
   input key value;
datalines;
12345  66
45612  99
;

data t2;
  input field1 othervalue;
  format field1 date9.;
datalines;
12345  99999
45612  88888
;

proc sql;
   create table example as
   select t1.*, t2.*
   from t1 as a
        left join
        t2 as b
   on t1.key=t2.field1
   ;
quit;

Re: convert a character field to a numeric field without resulting in an exponent

Tom — Sat, 02 Dec 2023 03:41:49 GMT

You can store 16 digits as a number, but only up to the maximum integer that SAS can represent before it starts having to round values. So unless you are positive the values will always be less than 9,007,199,254,740,992 you should keep it as character string. There is no real reason to store identifiers as numbers since you won't be doing any arithmetic on them.

45   data _null_;
46     maxint=constant('exactint');
47     len = length(cats(maxint));
48     put len= maxint=:comma32.;
49   run;

len=16 maxint=9,007,199,254,740,992