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nrose
Quartz | Level 8

Hi,

I am a fan of SAS Enterprise Guide, and although modest, the improvements in 6.1 are welcomed. However, part of the 'enhancements' is that dbf files are no longer able to be imported using the import wizard. Yes, dbf files are legacy, but they are still used, especially in the GIS community. Furthermore, why remove a capability? Now, many projects that have been migrated to 6.1 no longer work, and, it is unfair for our users to be asked to create proc import code to fix this, especially when they are working in environments where they are unable to access network drives through the use of code.

There was no documentation in 'What's New' and it is extremely risky to remove any feature from an application when there is no way to go back once a project has been converted.

Hopefully, the removal of features will at least be clearly documented in future updates.

Nick

8 REPLIES 8
Patrick
Opal | Level 21

Are you sure that your conclusions (no more supported) are correct or is it just so that it's no more working after upgrading? Have you opened a track with SAS Tech Support and did you get some official statement that dbf files are no more supported?

nrose
Quartz | Level 8

Hi Patrick,

Yes, I have confirmed with tech support, and the help in 6.1 does not list dbf as a supported type. One of our users noticed that the .dbf option was not listed as an importable type in the wizard, and, when you use all file types and try import a dbf it throws up an error. Of course, proc import works, but that is not the point.

Not sure why this support was removed.

Nick

owenwqp1
Obsidian | Level 7


Hi,Patrick,

I use "proc dbf" in base sas and it works well. And some dbf doc created with Fox6 may not be accepted by sas, but you can save it to earlier version of dbf doc to import. I'm not familiar with SAS Enterprise Guide, so I'm not sure whether it's helpful.

Owen

ChrisHemedinger
Community Manager

The DBF import relies on the 32-bit data providers that Microsoft provides, and with EG 6.1 as initially only 64-bit, these providers are incompatible.  That's one reason why it doesn't work in EG 6.1.

With the waning of DBF and the bit architecture problems, the DBF import capability was deprecated from EG.

The File->Import Data menu does not allow you to select a DBF file.  However, here's a trick.  With a 32-bit version of EG 5.1 or 6.1, you can drag a DBF file onto your EG project and that will kick-start the Import Data task into action.  This will allow you to import your DBF file into SAS.  Note that you need the 32-bit version of EG for this; EG 6.1 will have a 32-bit version very soon, to be released by the end of the year.

You should use this trick with caution...  Since DBF import is no longer a "sanctioned" capability, I don't expect it to be supported officially. 

Chris

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ballardw
Super User

Does this apply to Proc Mapimport as well?

ChrisHemedinger
Community Manager

MAPIMPORT is a SAS procedure that allows you to import 3rd party shape files (like ESRI files) and use them in map charts.  That's described here:

http://blogs.sas.com/content/sasdummy/2011/08/30/using-3rd-party-shape-files-to-build-map-charts-in-...

The Import Data task in EG isn't related to this.

Chris

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nrose
Quartz | Level 8

Thank Chris for the clarification.

I also note similar issues with access Microsoft Access databases.

It is a shame that this capability has been removed, and no effort to continue support and compatibility. I know it is difficult to keep everyone happy, but perhaps more explicit documentation of such changes would be helpful to prepare users and help inform decisions about whether to upgrade to a newer version of EG.

Thanks,

Nick

JimboBobJoe
Calcite | Level 5

Morning, I have this issue as well, we have 64bit eg 5.1 and the dbf function stopped working once we moved to that config. Also our MS access db, would not work either. In order to use eg to import the ms access tables i had to install ms office 64 bit to match EG 64bit. That solved the problem of that. With the dbf files I created external links to the dbf files thru the MS access database, this then allowed us to continue to import the DBF files into eg. Hope this helps.

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