how to use SAS to transfer an Excel file (xlsx) from a windows server (source) to unix server (dest)

[alepage]

Hello,

Before, we were using IBM Control-M to transfer an excel file from a windows server (the source) to a Unix server (destination) and for some reason  we don't know the file is being corrupted.

So I wonder if there is a nice way, not to read , just transfer an excel file from a windows server to unix server using SAS EG:

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[Reeza]

https://blogs.sas.com/content/sasdummy/2020/05/19/copy-files-in-sas-eg/

Is the Copy Files task an option?

[alepage]

yes copy files task could be an option just one time just to see the code generated. However, I would like to develop a SAS program that will do the job. I wonder if a Unix command could also be usefull.

My file is located on P:\transfert . How can I know, what's the real address of that. What's about using a Unix command. Could someone provide an example if my windows server is P:\temp\transfer

[Tom]

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@alepage wrote:
yes copy files task could be an option just one time just to see the code generated. However, I would like to develop a SAS program that will do the job. I wonder if a Unix command could also be usefull.

My file is located on P:\transfert . How can I know, what's the real address of that. What's about using a Unix command. Could someone provide an example if my windows server is P:\temp\transfer

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Well I doubt that your Windows PC has a physical drive that is using drive letter P:.  So most likely that drive letter is mapped to some network share.  Have your computer support mount that shared drive on the Unix host somewhere.  Then just read the file directly using the path on the Unix host that points to the same place that your Windows machine is using as the P: drive.

So if P: is mapped to \\hostname\sharename then have them mount \\hostname\sharename somewhere in the Unix filesystem.  Let's say they mounted it at /data/hostname/sharename/.  Then your SAS program can just be something like:

libname myfile xlsx '/data/hostname/sharename/transfert/myfile.xlsx';
proc copy inlib=myfile outlib=work;
run;

[alepage]

I have use the file transfer task which works

Now, I can I convert that into a sas code to make it work

%let _egcopySource = \\...\test.xlsx;
%let _egcopyTarget =/folder1/Temp;

Remember that I am trying to transfer an xlsx file.

[SASKiwi]

EG isn't a good tool for scheduling file transfers between servers. How is Control-M doing the transfers? FTP perhaps? If you ensure FTP is using a binary transfer then it is unlikely your spreadsheet will be corrupted.

[alepage]

That exactly what we are using. But for some reason we don't know, the field that contains a date and time format value is converted to a date field only during the transfer. We don't know why.

[AlanC]

That doesn't make a lot of sense.  How are you reading the file back in? It doesn't sound like an issue with the file transfer but the way the file is being read on the dest side.

[Kurt_Bremser]

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@alepage wrote:
That exactly what we are using. But for some reason we don't know, the field that contains a date and time format value is converted to a date field only during the transfer. We don't know why.

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This cannot be an FTP issue. Xlsx files are zip-compressed archives, so ftp would have to unpack, change the value, and re-compress the file. Which it can't do. If ftp changed anything, the whole file would be corrupted and unusable.

How did you check the file on the UNIX side after the transfer?

PS the "change" might come from the guessing of PROC IMPORT. That's why you should not use Excel files when consistency in a process is expected.

[alepage]

We have made some change into Control-M, i.e. changing append for overwrite and the issue seems to be solve.

Thanks everyone for your help.

However, it will be nice to get some SAS code to transfer a file from a Windows server to a Unix server, it could be interesting.

Regards