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nxmogil
Obsidian | Level 7

%let var = name age height;

%let var1 = %sysfunc(translate(&var, %str(), %str(,)));

%put &var1;

This is giving me output as name age height

but I need it as name ,age, height

Please correct where I am going wrong

1 ACCEPTED SOLUTION

Accepted Solutions
ballardw
Super User

Documentation. The second parameter is the TO value, the third is the From

%let var = name age height;

%let var1 = %sysfunc(translate(&var, %str(,), %str( )));

%put &var1;

@nxmogil wrote:

%let var = name age height;

%let var1 = %sysfunc(translate(&var, %str(), %str(,)));

%put &var1;

This is giving me output as name age height

but I need it as name ,age, height

Please correct where I am going wrong


 

View solution in original post

4 REPLIES 4
Astounding
PROC Star

The TRANSLATE function expects the "to" value to come before the "from" value.  So your expression translates the commas to blanks.  Reverse the second and third parameters:

%let var1 = %sysfunc(translate(&var, %str(,), %str( )));

Be sure to add a blank in side the %str function.  Nulls are different than blanks in macro language.

FreelanceReinh
Jade | Level 19

@Astounding wrote:

So your expression translates the commas to blanks.


Worse still, it would interpret words delimited by commas in &var, if any, as separate function arguments and hence apply unwanted additional character replacements to the first word only ...

ballardw
Super User

Documentation. The second parameter is the TO value, the third is the From

%let var = name age height;

%let var1 = %sysfunc(translate(&var, %str(,), %str( )));

%put &var1;

@nxmogil wrote:

%let var = name age height;

%let var1 = %sysfunc(translate(&var, %str(), %str(,)));

%put &var1;

This is giving me output as name age height

but I need it as name ,age, height

Please correct where I am going wrong


 

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