ERROR: No disk space is available for the write operation.

[_maldini_]

This PROC SORT is producing the following error (see complete log below). I have been using this PROC successfully for several days. All of the sudden, it produces this error. 

I'm using SAS University Edition w/ the Base Memory set to 5715 MB. I have over 30 GB of hard disk space. The data set has 5,220,930 observations and 32 variables.

Any clues here?

1 OPTIONS NONOTES NOSTIMER NOSOURCE NOSYNTAXCHECK;
55
56
57 PROC SORT DATA=neiss.neiss_subset_2;
58 BY year_;
59 RUN;

ERROR: No disk space is available for the write operation. Filename =
/tmp/SAS_util0001000016F4_localhost.localdomain/ut16F4000005.utl.
ERROR: Failure while attempting to write page 545 of sorted run 3.
ERROR: Failure while attempting to write page 16153 to utility file 1.
ERROR: Failure encountered while creating initial set of sorted runs.
ERROR: Failure encountered during external sort.
ERROR: Sort execution failure.
NOTE: The SAS System stopped processing this step because of errors.
NOTE: There were 5033089 observations read from the data set NEISS.NEISS_SUBSET_2.
WARNING: The data set NEISS.NEISS_SUBSET_2 may be incomplete. When this step was stopped there were 0 observations and 32
variables.
WARNING: Data set NEISS.NEISS_SUBSET_2 was not replaced because this step was stopped.
NOTE: PROCEDURE SORT used (Total process time):
real time 27.24 seconds
cpu time 17.02 seconds

60
61
62 OPTIONS NONOTES NOSTIMER NOSOURCE NOSYNTAXCHECK;
74

[Shmuel]

Are you using SAS Studio - University Edition ?

If positive than you are limitted by the VM (virtual machine) definitions.

Otherwise, are you sharing disk space with other users ?

If positive, you might be limitted by system/SAs administarator.

What SAS platform are you using ?

[_maldini_]

@Shmuel I'm using SAS University Edition w/ the Base Memory set to 5715 MB in the VM. This procedure worked yesterday!

[SuryaKiran]

One solution that might work to solve this problem is to use TAGSORT. It will reduce the space needed to sort.

PROC SORT tagsort DATA=neiss.neiss_subset_2;

BY year_;

RUN;

Or try compressing the dataset

DATA A (COMPRESS = YES);

SET B;

RUN;

[Shmuel · Accepted solution]

In case @SuryaKiran advice doen't help, check your WORK library, what other datasets are there.

[_maldini_]

@SuryaKiran tagsort worked! Thanks.

[Reeza]

Restart your VM. I think some SAS procs are leaving things in the work space that fills it up. 

5 million rows should only be 1 or 2 GB so you shouldn't have major issues but it won't be snappy by any means. 

I dont recall the exact specs of VM but you set the RAM and number of cores. It sounds like you've set the RAM to 5GB and I'm assuming 1 core. You can try changing it to two cores (not more) and see if that helps but I don't think it should. 

[Ksharp]

Make /folders/myfolders/ as your WORK library and add TAGSORT option:

libname xx v9 '/folders/myfolders/';
options user=xx;
proc sort data=have tagsort ;
......