topic Error Message: "Unmatched brackets were detected" but Is It Really Macro Variable Resolution Problem in SAS Health and Life Sciences

Error Message: "Unmatched brackets were detected" but Is It Really Macro Variable Resolution Problem

MaryR — Fri, 22 Jan 2016 15:24:14 GMT

Hi All,

I have a macro which is compiled prior to running my program in SDD. This is the macro:

%macro mr_sql_pct(numerator=, denominator=, newvar=, label=, decimal=1);

catt(put((sum(&numerator)/&denominator)*100, 5.&decimal)) as &newvar label="&label",

%mend mr_sql_pct;

I have code that is similar to the following:

proc sql noprint;

select count(distinct name) into :treated

from sashelp.class;

create table stats as

select

%mr_sql_pct(numerator=not missing(sex), denominator=%eval(&treated), newvar=pct, label=%)

sex label='Gender'

from sashelp.class

group by sex;

quit;

This code runs correctly in PC SAS, but in SDD if I even try to hit 'save' I get a message "Unmatched brackets were detected in the following statement(s)" and then it highlights everything from "create" to the semicolon. The program runs with errors, but I can't see where the unmatched brackets could possibly be. I have other programs that run similar macros in SDD, and only the programs that use a macro variable reference in the call to a macro are the ones that are giving these errors. So is the real problem the fact that I can't use this macro variable reference in the macro call? Is there a way to fix this without significant re-coding?

Thanks in advance for your help!

Cheers,

Mary R.

Re: Error Message: "Unmatched brackets were detected" but Is It Really Macro Variable Reso

MaryR — Fri, 22 Jan 2016 16:25:39 GMT

We have figured out the issue with this and I wanted to post it here too:

The problem is with the '%)' in the macro call. It seems that the '%' is masking the ')' in SDD, and that is causing the 'unmatched brackets' message. The solution is to simply put a space between the '%' and the ')'.

Thanks to all those who took a look a this question.

Cheers,

Mary R.

Re: Error Message: "Unmatched brackets were detected" but Is It Really Macro Variable Reso

ChrisHemedinger — Fri, 22 Jan 2016 16:30:48 GMT

Glad you found it @MaryR! I was about to ping @Lex_SAS and colleagues to make sure they saw the query.

Re: Error Message: "Unmatched brackets were detected" but Is It Really Macro Variable Reso

Lex_SAS — Fri, 22 Jan 2016 16:37:01 GMT

It is interesting that PC SAS did not have an issue with this .... Maybe a different SAS version compared to the one on SDD?

Re: Error Message: "Unmatched brackets were detected" but Is It Really Macro Variable Reso

Quentin — Fri, 22 Jan 2016 17:37:41 GMT

@Lex_SAS why would PC SAS have a problem with it?

It looks like valid code to me. The % alone should not be enough to mask the ), since it's not wrapped in %str(). At least, this simple example works fine:

1    %macro test(text=);
2    %put >>&text<<;
3    %mend test;
4    %test(text=some%)
>>some%<<

@MaryR's code also runs fine for me in PC SAS (9.3).

I don't know anything about SDD. But if the error message pops up when she hits "SAVE", wouldn't that suggest it's some SDD code parser/syntax highlighter that is having the problem, not actually SAS tokenizer?

Re: Error Message: "Unmatched brackets were detected" but Is It Really Macro Variable Reso

Lex_SAS — Fri, 22 Jan 2016 19:10:00 GMT

@Quentin Obviously PC SAS did not have an issue with it, but SDD did. I'll pass it onto Tech Support, since I'm no SDD expert either.

Re: Error Message: "Unmatched brackets were detected" but Is It Really Macro Variable Reso

MaryR — Tue, 01 Mar 2016 21:32:20 GMT

Thanks so much for your help!