Hi:
How did you create your library called "VM"???? Did you use a LIBNAME statement??? How are you accessing SAS -- via EG, using SAS Display Manager, or writing code and then doing batch submits via a command line command?
Let's say, for the sake of argument, that you are using SAS Display Manager and the Enhanced Editor for program submission. If you used a LIBNAME statement to point to the VM library and you pointed your LIBNAME statement to a physical directory called: c:\doc\mydata -- then your LIBNAME statement probably looked something like this:
[pre]
libname VM 'c:\doc\mydata';
[/pre]
If you used point and click windows, then the appropriate LIBNAME statement was issued for you behind the scenes.
You have 2 choices for working with the file your colleague sent you. Most SAS datasets on Windows and Unix have a file extension of .SAS7BDAT -- so these are your choices:
1) move/copy EXER.SAS7BDAT into c:\doc\mydata directory (or whatever real physical location you used for the library that you called 'VM')
or
2) put EXER.SAS7BDAT into another directory (like c:\temp) and just point to it with another LIBNAME statement:
[pre]
libname mydata 'c:\temp';
[/pre]
If you took choice #1, and put the data in the 'VM' location, then you would subsequently refer to the data with a 2 level name, VM.EXER; if you took choice #2, then you would subsequently refer to the data with a -different- 2 level name, MYDATA.EXER -- note how the "nickname" or library reference (either VM or MYDATA) identifies the library location for the data. Consider this PROC PRINT:
[pre]
proc print data=libref.dataset;
run;
would be:
1) proc print data=VM.EXER;
2) proc print data=MYDATA.EXER;
[/pre]
If you are using SAS Enterprise Guide, then you might want to look in the EG help for how to define and access data (because EG has a method for you to point to the data without worrying about the LIBNAME statement).
As for your .SAS file -- the program file. That file is just an ASCII text file. It does NOT have to be in the same library with the data. Of course, it's handy to have the code in the same physical location as the data. However, you access the program by issuing FILE --> OPEN commands -- so it really doesn't matter where the file is, you can open and include it it into your Editor or EG code node.
By default, on Windows, your "working directory" is someplace in C:\Documents and Settings -- you don't have to keep this as your working directory, but one thing you could do is put your .SAS program into this working directory instead of storing it in the physical directory with the data -- your choice. My tendency is to keep everything together while I'm testing or developing and then once the programs are working as I want, I put the programs in one directory, the data in a separate directory and the output in a third directory. You could start out with this method of working. I like to do it after, because it forces me to make one last pass through the programs and data to make sure that I have -everything- organized.
If you are working through the SAS tutorial, it was my memory that most of this information was contained in the tutorial. Of course, if you are doing an EG tutorial, then that would refer to EG windows, instead of Display Manager concepts.
This documentation describes the SAS environment and the process of submitting a program in Display Manager and using SAS Libraries:
http://support.sas.com/documentation/cdl/en/basess/58133/HTML/default/a001304302.htm
http://support.sas.com/documentation/cdl/en/basess/58133/HTML/default/a001360654.htm
http://support.sas.com/documentation/cdl/en/basess/58133/HTML/default/a001786394.htm
http://support.sas.com/documentation/cdl/en/basess/58133/HTML/default/a001612707.htm
Good luck.
cynthia
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