topic Replace missing values 0 by '*' using sas array in SAS Enterprise Guide

Replace missing values 0 by '*' using sas array

mdhtrivedi — Sun, 15 Jul 2018 04:07:08 GMT

Hello,

I have a xlsx file of sales_order which I have imported in SAS.

Customer_Id	Viewed	Cart Additions	Revenue	Order
1	3	1	0	0
39	0	0	8100	1
40	0	0	660	1
47	1	1	0	0
55	1	0	0	0
64	13	9	808	1
84	2	1	550	1

I want to replace 0's by '*' where 0 is a numeric and '*' is a character.

I have tried following code snippet to achieve this:-

data Online_Orders;  

    set Online_Orders;

    array nm(*) _numeric_;

    do _n_ = 1 to dim(nm);

    nm(_n_) = coalesce(nm(_n_),*);
end;

run;

But I couldn't achieve expected output. Kindly help me with this.

Thank you in advance!

Re: Replace missing values 0 by '*' using sas array

novinosrin — Sun, 15 Jul 2018 04:22:08 GMT

I don't think it is possible to replace numeric 0's with * char. You can use formats. Or you would have to create another char array and hold all those values as text along with * that replaced your 0's

Re: Replace missing values 0 by '*' using sas array

PaigeMiller — Sun, 15 Jul 2018 11:53:58 GMT

You can't replace a value of a numeric variable with a character value.

However, you could assign a format to make it appear as an asterisk, or you can assign it to be a missing value.

If you assign a format and make it appear as an asterisk, SAS will still do all calculations using a zero. To tell you the truth, without further explanation, I think this is a poor idea.

If you want to assign it a missing value, then SAS will treat the value as missing (not zero). There are "special" missing values if you want to use them, such as .A, which is treated as a missing and not a zero, and appears as the letter A when you look at it.

Re: Replace missing values 0 by '*' using sas array

Astounding — Sun, 15 Jul 2018 13:16:56 GMT

As you have been advised, you can't store a character value in a numeric variable. However, you could get the zeros to print as "M" instead of "0" if you desired:

if nm{_n_} = 0 then nm{_n_} = .M;

There are 27 special missing values you can choose from: .A through .Z as well as ._