':' in input statement

anushagandla — Fri, 08 Sep 2017 15:48:55 GMT

data temp;

input skill_set : $50. @ ;

--------------

---------------

run;

hi,

what do we mean by the above input statement, what is the meaning of ':' and '@' in the above statement.

Re: ':' in input statement

ballardw — Fri, 08 Sep 2017 16:11:21 GMT

The : is used to indicate that the format reading the data starts reading at the next non-blank column until it reaches a blank column in the data. If the : then a format may force reading more characters than you intend when the length of values vary. Note the value of x in the first data set and the error message in the first example step below. Then the behavior with the :

data example;
   input x $10. y;
datalines;
short 23
longer    19
;
run;

data example2;
   input x : $10. y;
datalines;
short 23
longer    19
;
run;

The @ holds the input pointer on the same line. One use is conditionally read data depending on the values of something read before the @ sign.

topic ':' in input statement in SAS Programming

':' in input statement

Re: ':' in input statement