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Patrick
Opal | Level 21
Hi

This is a follow up question to thread "Break and Skip statement" http://support.sas.com/forums/thread.jspa?threadID=12388&tstart=0

Let's assume I have already a considerable number of reports created with PROC REPORT and written to the "listing" destination.

Let's further assume I'm getting now the requirement that output has to be in PDF format (I've seen already such requirements in real life situations).

Instead of modifying all existing code I believe a shortcut could be to send the listing output to a 3rd party PDF converter in a post processing step.

My question is: Is there already such a converter available as part of the SAS package ("someone" is rendering PDF in SAS) and would it be possible to send listing output "on-the-fly" to this PDF converter?

Thanks
Patrick
4 REPLIES 4
Cynthia_sas
SAS Super FREQ
Hi:
This forum poster used something called "CutePDF" to do what you are asking:
http://support.sas.com/forums/thread.jspa?messageID=37502鉾

In the past, I have used a product called Text2PDF by the FyTek (http://www.fytek.com/products.php?pg=text2pdf) company when I needed to convert a LISTING file (captured with PROC PRINTTO) directly to PDF. The reason I used Text2PDF was that it had a command line interface and so I could create a .TXT file using PROC PRINTTO to capture the LISTING output and then issue an X command to send the created TXT file to a PDF.

There are probably other ways to "distill" a file to PDF form. I find most of my PDF tips and tricks on a web site called Planet PDF ( http://www.planetpdf.com/ ).

I believe that the only way to use SAS to produce PDF files is to:
1) use ODS PDF
2) use the BI Platform "Print to PDF" interface (such as in Web Report Studio) (and of course, this option is not printing LISTING output, at all, but is generally printing SAS Report output to PDF form)
3) issue an X command or SYSTASK command to do the "distilling" or creation of a PDF file using a 3rd party product (such as Adobe Acrobat, CutePDF, FyTek Text2PDF, or others)

Since SAS Enterprise Guide does not automatically create LISTING output, I believe the only way to use EG to create PDF files would be to use ODS PDF -- and, as you have noted, that will not be an "exact" replica of the LISTING window type of output. Since EG has the X command turned off by default, that means that #3 might be problematic without some help.

But, as far as I know, there is no PDF converter built into SAS to convert LISTING output to PDF format directly.

cynthia
Patrick
Opal | Level 21
Hi Cynthia

Thanks a lot for your answer and the links you provided.
I'll add Planet PDF to my favourites.

The thing which confused me was "SAS Enterprise Guide does not automatically create LISTING output".

Not being a big EG user I always thought that under "Results Formats" the check box "SAS Report" sends output to the "listing" destination.

Thanks
Patrick
Cynthia_sas
SAS Super FREQ
Hi:
The "SASReport" choice in EG is SASReport XML report format that is used by EG, as well as the BI Platform for creating multi-section reports in client applications like Web Report Studio. Other client applications, such as the SAS Add-in for Microsoft Office and SAS Enterprise Guide and the SAS Information Delivery Portal all know how to open and render SASReport XML formatted reports.

The LISTING destination choice in EG, on my system (SAS 9.2, EG 4.3) can be found by following this click path:
Tools --> Options --> Results (in left pane) click on Results General --> then select the check box for "Text output"

In EG, SASReport output looks very like HTML output because EG renders the XML results into a "friendly" form for viewing. SASReport format and the HTML choice will look almost exactly alike in EG.

If you select "Text output" for your EG results, you will see the equivalent of what folks see in the LISTING window or OUTPUT window when they use the SAS windowing environment and SAS Display Manager.

If you are using the BI Platform and Web Report Studio, the SASReport XML format is the only report format that you can generate for Web Report Studio reports -- the choices of LISTING or HTML are not available for Web Report Studio.

You should see a very noticeable difference in how your EG output looks if you select "Text output" in the Results window.

cynthia
Patrick
Opal | Level 21
Hi Cynthia
Thanks again for this clarification.
Seems I should do some reading here.
Have a happy New Year!
Patrick

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