TURN MACROVARIABLE FROM MISSING TO 0?

[SimoneStefano96]

Hello,

how can I turn a macrovariable currently having missing value to being zero?

Thanks,

Your sincerely,

Simone 

[Tom]

If you want to change the value use a %LET statement.

If you want to change it conditionally then use a %IF/%THEN/%DO block.

Macro variables do not have a concept of missing.  They are just text strings.

If by missing you mean not defined then use:

%if not %symexist(mvar) %then %do;
  %let mvar=0;
%end;

If by missing you mean totally empty then use:

%if 0=%length(&mvar) %then %do;
  %let mvar=0;
%end;

But you might want to instead update the code that is creating the macro variable to create it with zero for missing.

So if you created macro variable MVAR from actual variable VAR then perhaps update the code to be more like this:

call symputx('mvar',coallesce(var,0));

[SimoneStefano96 · Accepted solution]

Hello @Tom ,

thanks for your answer. The %IF/%THEN/%DO block was just what I was looking for.

Have a nice day, 

Simone