topic Re: How I can see no of observations in my huge dataset (proc contentents gives missing value) in SAS Programming

How I can see no of observations in my huge dataset (proc contentents gives missing value)

Debi — Sun, 29 May 2016 12:26:10 GMT

Hi there,

I have a big dataset. I want to see no of observations of that dataset. When I use 'Proc contents' , it gives me a missing value {dot(.)} against the "observations" field.

Is there any other way, I can get this no of observation. I don't want to use Proc sql;select count(*) as it takes a lot of time to display the output .

Thanks,

Debi

Re: How I can see no of observations in my huge dataset (proc contentents gives missing value)

Astounding — Sun, 29 May 2016 13:31:23 GMT

The typical cases where you can't see the number of observations in your SAS data set: you don't really have a SAS data set. You might have a view instead, or you might have access to a table that can be treated as a SAS data set but is really stored in an external data base format. The output from PROC CONTENTS might provide some of those details.

It is likely that you have no choice but to wait for the COUNT(*) method to finish. (If there is an external data base involved, you may be able to switch to pass-through SQL, but that's jumping ahead of the game right now.)

Re: How I can see no of observations in my huge dataset (proc contentents gives missing value)

Clash — Sun, 29 May 2016 20:28:00 GMT

Here is what you want;
data _null_;
if 0 then set test nobs=nobs;
call symputx(”nobs”,nobs);
stop;
run;

Re: How I can see no of observations in my huge dataset (proc contentents gives missing value)

Kurt_Bremser — Mon, 30 May 2016 05:52:52 GMT

As @Astounding already mentioned, this won't work with views.