I have sas dataset. Can we compress the size of this existing sas dataset using any sas statement?

[yabwon]

https://documentation.sas.com/?docsetId=ledsoptsref&docsetTarget=n014hy7167t2asn1j7qo99qv16wa.htm&do...

[Prashanth10]

But yabwon.. but compress would create a new output sas datset. But i dont want to create a new datset. Is there any other way?

[Kurt_Bremser]

In order to remove redundant information from the dataset, you have to rewrite it. That is a very obvious given.

[yabwon · Accepted solution]

data old(compress=char);
  set old;
run;

[Ksharp]

options compress=yes;
data new;
set old;
run;

[Prashanth10]

Thanks ksharp..but this method will create a new dataset. But i dont want to create a new dataset. Is there any other way?

[Tom]

Please provide more context on what you are doing. 

I find that compressing SAS datasets with ZIP or GZIP will reduce the file size a lot (up to 80-90 percent reduction on many cases).  But then you will need to uncompress them to use them.

[yabwon]

@Tom 

Just a side note.

With the current SAS (9.4M2 and newer) you don't need any external ZIPping software.

The following code makes 128KB file into 2KB zip.

data class; /* demo dataset */
  set sashelp.class;
run;

filename cmprss ZIP "%sysfunc(pathname(work))/class.zip" member="class.sas7bdat" lrecl = 1 recfm = f;

filename in "%sysfunc(pathname(work))/class.sas7bdat" lrecl = 1 recfm = f;

data _null_;
  rc = fcopy("in", "cmprss");
  put rc = ;
run;

and the following one will unzip it back:

data _null_;
  rc = fcopy("cmprss", "in");
  put rc = ;
run;

All the best

Bart