Macro to set variable length not working

[Walternate]

Hi,

I have a variable list:

%let sas_vnames = v1 v2 v3...etc. 

And a corresponding var length list:

%let sas_vlngth = $10.^$30.$10.^etc. 

I used ^ as an arbitrary delimiter. 

This is the macro code to set the length:

/*RENAME EXCEL VARS TO SAS VAR NAMES*/

data sasnames_&i ;

/*BUILD LENGTH STATEMENTS*/

   %macro put_lngth;

    %let p = 1;

%do %while (%scan(&sas_vnames., &p.)>' ');

    %let sas_var = %scan(&sas_vnames., &p.);

%let sas_vlngth = %scan(&sas_vlngth., &p., ^);

length &sas_var. &sas_vlngth.; 

%let p = %eval(&p+1);

    %end;

   %mend put_lngth;

    %put_lngth;

set imported_file_&letter._&i.;

run;

From what I can tell, it's cycling through the var name list correctly but not the var length list. 

For a given run, var length will either be blank or have a value that is not the correct value. 

Any help is much appreciated. 

[Tom · Accepted solution]

SAS can count for you.

So if you have these three variables:

%let sas_vnames = v1 v2 v3; 
%let sas_vlngth = $10.^$30.^$10.;

You can use code like:

length
%do index=1 to %sysfunc(countw(&sas_vlngth,^));
  %scan(&sas_vnames,&index,%str( )) %scan(&sas_vlngth,&index,^)
%end;
;

To generate the statement:

length v1 $10. v2 $30. v3 $10.;

[Kathryn_SAS]

I would suggest the following revised code:

%let sas_vnames = v1 v2 v3; 
%let sas_vlngth = $10.^$30.^$10.;
 
/*RENAME EXCEL VARS TO SAS VAR NAMES*/
data sasnames_&i ;
/*BUILD LENGTH STATEMENTS*/
%macro put_lngth;
%let count=%sysfunc(countw(&sas_vnames,%str( )));
%put &count;
%do p=1 %to &count;

%let sas_var = %scan(&sas_vnames., &p.,%str( ));
%let sas_len = %scan(&sas_vlngth., &p., %str(^));
 
length &sas_var. &sas_len.; 

%end;
 
%mend put_lngth;
%put_lngth;
 
set imported_file_&letter._&i.;
run;