Hello all,
I have an ODBC connection to a housing DB, one field I need has a '#' pound sign or hashtag in the field name, (no I do not know the person that designed it) they could use a good shaking if it was legal haha... 😎
proc sql;
create table testing_kmj as
select * from my_lib.my_table
where 1 = 2
;quit;
proc contents data= testing_kmj ORDER=VARNUM;
run;
Variables in Creation Order
# Variable Type Len Format Informat Label
...
6 ID Char 250 $250. $250. ID
7 RM# Char 250 $250. $250. RM#
8 AssetType Char 250 $250. $250. AssetType
9 FacilityFullName Char 500 $500. $500. FacilityFullName
Anyway, I am trying to rename it and format it to: $19. the max size I have found in all year's worth of the data set to date.
proc sql;
create table my_new_table as
select distinct
ID AS emplid format = $11. Informat=$11. length 11 label='emplid',
Patron_SK_FK format = 11. Informat=11. length 8 label='Patron_SK_FK',
EffectiveDate,
EndDate,
/* trim(RM#) as rm_num format = $19. Informat=$19. length 19 label='rm_num',*/
RM# as testing
from my_lib.my_table
;quit;
I get this log error:
13104 RM# as testing,
-
22
200
ERROR 22-322: Syntax error, expecting one of the following: a quoted string, !, !!, &, (, *, **, +, ',', -, '.', /, <, <=, <>, =, >, >=, ?, AND, AS, BETWEEN, CONTAINS, EQ, EQT, FORMAT, FROM, GE, GET, GT, GTT, IN, INFORMAT, INTO, IS, LABEL, LE, LEN,
LENGTH, LET, LIKE, LT, LTT, NE, NET, NOT, NOTIN, OR, TRANSCODE, ^, ^=, |, ||, ~, ~=.
ERROR 200-322: The symbol is not recognized and will be ignored.
I can proc print the data its all there (when I actually read in the data) as I need, it's just getting rid of the hard to use column name I want in this case. A data step would be fine too.
I have played around a bit with:
options validvarname = any;
options VALIDMEMNAME = extend;
These options & v7 are not helping me in this case. PS if it helps I am using Windows10, and SAS 9.4 M3
TIA -Keith
If you re-import the data with the setting VALIDVARNAME=V7 it will convert RM# to RM_ which is a valid SAS name.
Once you set the VALIDVARNAME=ANY option you still need to use name literals when referencing names that break the normal rules.
'RM#'n
If you re-import the data with the setting VALIDVARNAME=V7 it will convert RM# to RM_ which is a valid SAS name.
SASKiwi,
"If you re-import the data with the setting VALIDVARNAME=V7 it will convert RM# to RM_ which is a valid SAS name."
I miss understood what this option was doing. This is the easiest fix, what I missed was that this option 'auto' changes in my case RM# to RM_ I thought it was making RM# a legitimate name, and then I would have to rename it. d'oh. Thank you. -KJ
Also try another libname option (I don't remember exactly )
libname my_lib db2 dsn=xxx preserve_col_name=yes ;
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