topic Re: Read Log in SAS Programming

Read Log

Ronein — Tue, 06 Jan 2026 10:50:29 GMT

Hello

When I run SAS Program that is long I dont have the time to read the all log .

Usually I search in Log: Error, Warning and also use CNTRL F to search "UNI" (to find Unintial varaibles).

My question -

Are there other buz words that you recommend me to search in Log( via CNTRL F)?

Re: Read Log

Kurt_Bremser — Tue, 06 Jan 2026 12:04:02 GMT

Also look for the typical patterns of conversion NOTEs and NOTEs for missing values caused by erroneous calculations.

But frankly, you must read the whole log regularly to catch more complex failures. Must. I mean it.

Re: Read Log

Quentin — Tue, 06 Jan 2026 13:40:44 GMT

I suggest using a log scanner program. This can be a SAS program, or a shell script or whatever. If you search on lexjansen.com, you'll find plenty of papers on log scanning.

Many will search for ERROR, WARNING and have a list of NOTES they consider bad. I like the approach in Li & Troxell (https://www.lexjansen.com/nesug/nesug01/cc/cc4008.pdf) who recommend passing a list of good NOTES and treating any NOTE that is not in the good list as bad.

Re: Read Log

SASKiwi — Tue, 06 Jan 2026 18:59:44 GMT

My approach is to implement programs that don't have errors, warnings or unitialized variable notes to start with. That means something has changed if I then run the program and such messages are written.

Also I run all production programs via a scheduler where an email will be triggered if there is an error so I only need to look at programs that generate an email. I then check the bottom of the SAS log to see if there is an error summary which looks like this:

ERROR: Errors printed on pages 710,714,716,722,723,724,726,727,735,740,741,742,743,745,746,755,756,757,758,759,760,766,767,768,770,
                               771,772,774,776,777,778,779,780,781,782,783,784,785,786,787,791,792,793.

I then only need to investigate page 710 to start with. By following simple processes like this you can reduce your log searching considerably.

Also running your programs in SAS EG or SAS Studio will produce a log summary of errors and warnings and there are function keys to search through these: