Datetime value to date

[David_Billa]

Can soomeone help me to convert character datetime value to numeric date? Desired output is '01DEC2021'd which is in date9. format

data test;
a='2021-12-01 21:56:59.0000000';
b=input(a,27.);
run;

[FreelanceReinh · Accepted solution]

data test;
a='2021-12-01 21:56:59.0000000';
d=input(scan(a,1,' '),yymmdd10.);
format d date9.;
run;

[Kurt_Bremser]

You can apply the YYMMDD10. informat directly, as it will only read the first 10 characters:

data test;
a = '2021-12-01 21:56:59.0000000';
b = input(a,yymmdd10.);
format b yymmdd10.;
run;

To read the whole string as a datetime, use the E8601DT. informat:

data test;
a = '2021-12-01 21:56:59.0000000';
b = input(a,e8601dt26.);
c = datepart(b);
format
  b e8601dt26.6
  c yymmdd10.
;
run;

[ballardw]

I have a lot of files that apparently originate in not-well set up databases where I get date values that come as datetime values like that, some times as many as 30 date fields per record. Every single "time" component is 00:00:00. So using just the date format to read the date part makes lots of sense and I do it in the data step to read the file instead of waiting to fix it later.