ERROR: A character operand was found in the %EVAL function or %IF condition where a numeric oper

[sam1231]

Hi,

%let ab= \\trg\mt-4tsr\stud\err\pgm\out

%macro tr(ds=);

    %if &ds. = &ab %then %do;

      data afg;

      set sashelp.cars;

     run;

%mend;

%tr(ds=&ab);

i am getting error

ERROR: A character operand was found in the %EVAL function or %IF condition where a numeric
operand is required. The condition was: &ds.=&ab.

[yabwon]

Hi @sam1231 

1) there is semicolon missing in the %let statement

2) there is %end; missing in the macro code

3) make it:

%bquote(&ds.) = %bquote(&ab)

4) read this article: https://stats.idre.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/bt185.pdf

5) and this article: https://support.sas.com/resources/papers/proceedings09/022-2009.pdf

All the best

Bart

[Quentin]

Adding to @yabwon 's recommendations for macro quoting papers:

https://support.sas.com/resources/papers/proceedings/proceedings/sugi28/011-28.pdf

https://analytics.ncsu.edu/sesug/2008/CS-049.pdf

All four are excellent papers, worth reading at least once a year. : )

[PaigeMiller]

You might want to try this

%if %bquote(&ds) = %bquote(&ab) %then %do;

If that's not it, please turn on the debugging options as follows:

options mprint mlogic symbolgen;

run the code again, and show us the entire LOG file (not just the error messages) by clicking on the {i} icon and pasting the log into the window that appears. Do not skip this step.

[Astounding]

%BQUOTE should solve this.  Another easy way:

%if "&ds." = "&ab" %then %do;

The basic problem is that macro language sees the "-" in the middle of the string and decides that it needs to subtract.

The use of double quotes suppresses that interpretation of the "-" although it introduces complications if one or both strings contain leading or trailing blanks.

[Kurt_Bremser]

Fix the obvious ERRORs (missing semicolon and %end), and use quotes for the strings:

73         %let ab= \\trg\mt-4tsr\stud\err\pgm\out;
 74         
 75         %macro tr(ds=);
 76         %if "&ds." = "&ab" %then %do;
 77         data afg;
 78         set sashelp.cars;
 79         run;
 80         %end;
 81         %mend;
 82         
 83         %tr(ds=&ab);
 
 NOTE: There were 428 observations read from the data set SASHELP.CARS.
 NOTE: The data set WORK.AFG has 428 observations and 15 variables.