combining two columns

[yoyong555]

Hi everyone.

I want to get the missing information in var1 from var2. 

Sometimes var1 already has the information (e.g. inputs 1 and 4). But sometimes information for both var1 and var2 are not missing. Can be similar (e.g. input3) and dissimilar (e.g. input5). In case of dissimilar information, the information in var1 is always selected.

The data looks like this.

data ddd;

input ID var1 $ var2 $;

cards;

1 a .  

2 . b

3 c c

4 d .

5 e f 

;

run;

I would like a new column (new_var) to be added to the file to look like this.

input   new_var

1             a

2             b

3             c

4             d

5             e

Thanks for your help.

[Astounding]

new_var = coalesce (var1, var2) ;

[PGStats · Accepted solution]

If var1 and var2 are character, use function coalescec:

new_var = coalescec (var1, var2) ;