Snowflake temp table to SAS dataset

freshstarter — Thu, 11 Dec 2025 12:22:39 GMT

Hi all,

I’m working on fetching large tables from Snowflake into SAS WORK datasets. Here’s my situation:

We have a pre-assigned SAS library (snow) for Snowflake access, with all the following settings:

BULKLOAD=YES BULKUNLOAD=YES BL_INTERNAL_STAGE='@~' BL_DELETE_DATAFILE=YES BL_COMPRESS=YES BL_USE_ESCAPE=YES BL_NUM_READ_THREADS=8 /* 8 CPUs on a node */

This library does not define database or schema, and all developers use this shared library.

I need to fetch data from a large Snowflake table (~200M rows, 7–8 columns).

I want to use BULKUNLOAD (with BL_NUM_DATA_FILES) to speed up the fetch, but I’m running into some limitations.

Current Pass-Through Approach

proc sql;
    connect using snow as snow;
    execute (use role SF_Role);
    execute (use warehouse M_VWH);
    create table work.test as
    select columnA, columnB
    from connection to snow
        (select * from database.schema.snowflake_table);
    disconnect from snow;
quit;

Observations:

The Snowflake pass through query executes quickly (~8 seconds), but fetching into SAS WORK takes 13+ minutes.

Because I’m using PROC SQL pass-through, the BULKUNLOAD and internal stage mechanism is not used.

Using LIBNAME + DATA Step Works Fast

libname sf_bulk snow dsn=snowflake warehouse=M_VWH role=SF_Role
database=db schema=Schema authdomain="Snowflake"
BULKLOAD=YES BULKUNLOAD=YES
BL_INTERNAL_STAGE='@~'
BL_DELETE_DATAFILE=YES
BL_COMPRESS=YES
BL_USE_ESCAPE=YES
BL_NUM_READ_THREADS=8;

data work.test;
set sf_bulk.snowflake_table;
run;

This approach uses BULKUNLOAD and internal stage, and the fetch completes in ~4 minutes.

I verified in Snowflake using list @~ that intermediate bulk files were created.

I cannot switch all code to DATA step because pass-through is needed for transformation logic inside Snowflake.

So I thought of creating a temporary table in Snowflake with all the transformations, then fetch it via SAS:

libname sf_temp snow dsn=snowflake warehouse=M_VWH role=SF_Role
database=db schema=Schema authdomain="Snowflake"
BULKLOAD=YES BULKUNLOAD=YES
BL_INTERNAL_STAGE='@~'
BL_DELETE_DATAFILE=YES
BL_COMPRESS=YES
BL_USE_ESCAPE=YES
BL_NUM_READ_THREADS=8;

proc sql;
connect using sf_temp as sf_temp;
execute (
create temporary table temp_mytable as
select columnA, columnB
from database.schema.snowflake_table
) by sf_temp;

create table work.test as
select *
from connection to sf_temp
(select * from database.schema.temp_mytable);
disconnect from sf_temp;
quit;

Observations:

This works, but BULKUNLOAD and internal stage are not used, so performance is slow.

I tried using data step in between , but it got failed with no temp table available.

Advice Needed

1. Is there any way to use BULKUNLOAD / internal stage with a temporary table via SAS/ACCESS?

2. Would DBMSTEMP= help in this scenario, or is it unsupported with Snowflake?

3. Are there any best practices for using temp tables and bulk fetch with pre-assigned libraries?

Please let me know if you have any solution for this. Thank you..

Re: Snowflake temp table to SAS dataset

Tom — Thu, 11 Dec 2025 14:14:15 GMT

Not sure about Snowflake but in other databases that allow temporary table they usually appear in a separate schema. Usually based on the username of the database user.

Once you figure out if that is true for Snowflake and what schema it uses try adding the SCHEMA= dataset option to your SAS code that tries to use the bulk load options.

And if you do want to try to make two librefs see if you can make them using CONNECTION=GLOBAL on both libref definitions.

topic Re: Snowflake temp table to SAS dataset in SAS Programming

Snowflake temp table to SAS dataset

Re: Snowflake temp table to SAS dataset