topic Re: converting DTWKDATX29. to a worddate18. in SAS Programming

converting DTWKDATX29. to a worddate18.

robm — Fri, 11 Mar 2016 23:39:50 GMT

I have a data filed that is DTWKDATX29. what I need to do is this

proc sql noprint;
select max(put("As Of Date"n),worddate18.) into :aofd from robm.STCD110a;
quit;

get the max value into aofd how do I convert a DTWKDATX29. to a worddate18.

Re: converting DTWKDATX29. to a worddate18.

ballardw — Fri, 11 Mar 2016 23:48:26 GMT

DTWKDATX means the valueis a datetime. So you want to extract the date portion using datepart(variablename) and then put that value or assign the format to a resulting variable.

Re: converting DTWKDATX29. to a worddate18.

FreelanceReinh — Sun, 13 Mar 2016 22:51:30 GMT

Hi @robm,

The expression

max(put("As Of Date"n),worddate18.)

is syntactically incorrect (both closing parentheses should be at the end). Also, please note that with max(put(...)) you would select the "largest" formatted value, i.e. the alphabetically last value. Using this sort order together with the WORDDATE18. format, 'September 30, 2016' would be the "maximum" date of 2016 (and ' May 1, 2016' the "minimum," due to right-alignment).

Therefore, I think you should use the following code:

proc sql noprint;
select put(datepart(max("As Of Date"n)),worddate18.) into :aofd trimmed
from robm.STCD110a;
quit;

That is,

select the latest among the non-missing datetime values
extract the date part from this datetime value
apply the WORDDATE18. format to the resulting date value
trim leading (and trailing) blanks from the formatted value before it is written to macro variable AOFD

This assumes that "As Of Date"n is a numeric variable containing SAS datetime values and that you need a text such as 'January 5, 2016' in macro variable AOFD. A datetime format (like DTWKDATX29.) that may be associated with "As Of Date"n is irrelevant here.

Re: converting DTWKDATX29. to a worddate18.

robm — Mon, 14 Mar 2016 13:51:21 GMT

yeah! that worked perfectly thanks!