Reading XML into SAS

[Peter_C]

DDE can read that data!

I looked at the first two options in the excel dialog

As an XML table it creates a schema and a new workboot with references, like Excel|[Book2]Sheet1

After selecting the data area and copying to the clipboard, SAS sees the DDE triplet as

'Excel|[Book2]Sheet1!R1C1:R37C6'

When selecting "As a read-only workbook", the object references retain more of the original names and the clipboard triplet becomes

Excel|http://www.w3schools.com/xml/[plant_catalog.xml]plant_catalog!R1C1:R38C7

Once you open the XML as a readonly workbook in excel, a sufficient data step to read this from base SAS on windows, is

data ;

infile

'Excel|http://www.w3schools.com/xml/[plant_catalog.xml]plant_catalog!R1C1:R38C7'

         device=dde notab lrecl=1000 dsd dlm='09'x truncover ;

input (col1-col8)($) ;

run;

Those who seek an even more general approach can remove the "row reference" allowing DDE to load as many rows as are present and up to 255 columns, with the triplet

Excel|http://www.w3schools.com/xml/[plant_catalog.xml]plant_catalog!C1:C255

The data step above provides just the first 8 characters of each column, but enough to demo the principle. To load wider, change the ($) in the INPUT statement to (:$30.)

Always use TRUNCOVER to deal with short lines and DSD to skip empty cells

It does show interesting differences when comparing these two presentations from excel.

It also points out what we might hope for in the next release of improvements to SAS XML LIBNAME engines

That "we can" does not mean that "we should", as the number of ways that DDE can disappoint are many!

[ThomasCox]

Thought I should update this to point out that the AUTOMAP option has indeed been added to the SAS XML Libname engine. See SAS(R) 9.4 XML LIBNAME Engine: User's Guide

While automapping make  pretty decent "best guess" at how the data should be structured, it may not always bring in data structured the way you like.