How to read multiple CSV files using SAS?

[Yoshihisa-Yokoi]

Hi everyone,

I am new to SAS programming and I am trying to read multiple CSV files into SAS. I have tried using the infile statement with a wildcard to read all the files in a folder, but it doesn't seem to be working. Can someone please guide me on how to read multiple CSV files in SAS?

Here's the code I am using:

filename files "/path/to/folder/*.csv";

data mydata;
  infile files dlm=',' firstobs=2;
  input var1 var2 var3;
run;

I am not getting any errors, but it seems like only the first file is being read. I have searched online for a solution but haven't been able to find one that works for me. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you!

[Tom · Accepted solution]

Your code will only skip the header line on the FIRST file it finds.

To skip all of the headers use the FILENAME= option of the INFILE statement to create a variable to contain the name of the current file so you can skip the header line of each file.

data mydata;
  length filen $256;
  infile "/path/to/folder/*.csv" dsd truncover filename=filen;
  input @@;
  if filen ne lag(filen) then delete;
  input var1 var2 var3;
run;

The variable created by the FILENAME= option is not output. So if you want to keep the name of the file that contributed the current observation then add another variable.  This code will also add a simple numeric variable to count how many files have been read.

data mydata;
  length filen $256;
  infile "/path/to/folder/*.csv" dsd truncover filename=filen;
  input @@;
  if filen ne lag(filen) then do;
     fileno+1;
     delete;
  end;
  input var1 var2 var3;
  filename=filen;
run;

[Kurt_Bremser]

Since a file reference can also be used for output, wildcards don't make sense there.

Do everything in the INFILE:

data mydata;
  infile  "/path/to/folder/*.csv" dlm=',' firstobs=2;
  input var1 var2 var3;
run;

You may need to add code to skip the header line in every new file.