REST API documentation for transfer endpoint for import/export

[aedwards9]

I want to do import/export using the REST API transfer functionality as explained in this video:

https://communities.sas.com/t5/SAS-Global-Forum-Proceedings/Moving-SAS-Viya-Contents-A-RESTful-Way/t...

The REST API end point it mentions is: /transfer/exportjobs

But I can't find that documented in the REST API spec:

https://developer.sas.com/home.html

Can anyone help / explain why it isn't there?

Seems to suggest here it isn't intended for use:

https://communities.sas.com/t5/Administration-and-Deployment/Upload-JSON-package-using-REST-API/m-p/...

But if that's the case, why did they make the video telling people how to do it?

[BrunoMueller · Accepted solution]

Instead of using undocumented API's, I suggest to use the sas-viya transfer plugin. See some examples in the doc https://go.documentation.sas.com/doc/en/sasadmincdc/v_029/calcontentmig3x/n0u4qkc837891vn1w8pd2rbqax...

Also have a look at this https://communities.sas.com/t5/SAS-Communities-Library/You-CAN-take-it-with-you-Saving-SAS-Viya-Cont...

[aedwards9]

That's fine if that's the recommended approach - just wanted to make sure I wasn't just missing it from the documentation.

I think our main challenge will be the stipulation:

The CLI requires that the machine running the tool has access to the internet.

(https://support.sas.com/downloads/package.htm?pid=2512)

If our environment is closed network then does it mean we can't automate the import/export? If so, do you know specifically what internet access we would need to open up for it to work?

[BrunoMueller]

Only to download the tool and install the plugins you need internet access, this can be done on any system.

Once you have the sas-viya CLI and the plugins then you transfer the tool and the plugins to your machine without internet access.

See also here Advanced: Set Up a Shared Location for more information.

[aedwards9]

Ah great good to know thanks

[AllanBowe]

Just "fyi", an alternative approach is to keep the source for your jobs in a GIT repository (subject to all the regular development workflows like branches, linting, and pipelines) and just PUSH the jobs to the relevant SAS environment for processing.

No need to export then.  Your source of truth is the GIT repo.

A writeup of this approach is available here:  https://communities.sas.com/t5/SAS-Global-Forum-Proceedings/Scaffolding-SAS-Projects-With-NPM-and-SA...

[aedwards9]

Thanks - we will be using Git for SAS code so I think we will probably go for something like that. The question was mainly for SAS VA reports - I believe they can't be integrated with / push to Git without the export, is that right?

[AllanBowe]

that's right, it's not really feasible to build JSON reports in an IDE!

We're looking to add VA export / import to the SASjs CLI (https://github.com/sasjs/cli) but it's not ready yet.

[aedwards9]

Thanks all