Automate file naming with date value that is 7 day from today

[joshua_james]

Hey guys.

I have a created a program that is going to grab data from one excel spreadsheet and chuck it into another one weekly. It is going to import the data into a specific named range for that week.

My question - Is there any code that I can use that changings the name in my code to the date 7 days ago?

For example, this is part of my current code -

libname xls excel 'H:\TEST.xlsm';

proc datasets lib = xls nolist ;

delete Q20160210 ;

quit ;

data xls.Q20160210 ;

set THISMONTH ;

run ;

libname xls clear;

Is there any way to get the progame to automatically change Q(Date) to Q(Todays Date - 7)?

Hopefully this makes sense and thanks in advance.

Josh

[Reeza · Accepted solution]

Welcome to the world of macro variables.

Create a macro variable that is 7 days from today. Replace the portion of your code that is the date with the macro variable reference, in this case: &cdate_7.

I like to use a data _null_ step to create my macro variables as it's more intuitive. You could do it with just a single %let statement. There's a lot of code an examples online, once you know what to search for. 

data _null_;
cdate=today();
cdate_7 = today()-7;

call symputx('cdate_7', put(cdate_7, yymmddn8.));
run;

%put &cdate_7.;

And then modify your code accordingly.

proc datasets lib = xls nolist ;
delete Q&cdate_7. ;
quit ;
 
data xls.Q&cdate_7.;
set THISMONTH ;
run ;

Good Luck!

[joshua_james]

 Worked perfectly! Thanks heaps! You have freed up my Monday's haha!

[Ksharp]

%let q=%sysfunc(intnx(day,%sysfunc(today()),-7),yymmddn8.);

%put &q ;