%do %to %end?

[ybz12003]

Hello:

I have the following macro codes from the previous programmer who has been gone and no way to find.   Could someone let me know what the 'fmt&i._' refer to and the 'Z' is refer to something?  Also, does the 'Program' in the macro mean it need to run by using the 'data' before the do loop?  Thanks.

%macro in(program,z,data);

Libname Workshop "\\Pathway\data";


%include "\\Pathway\&program..sas";

data workshop.&data;
        length LABEL $ 200;
	set %do i=1 %to &z;
	fmt&i._ %end;;
	by FMTNAME START END LABEL;
run;

%mend in;

%in(ABC_Time_check,19,Time_formats);  
%in(ABC_Place_check,113,Place_formats);  

[novinosrin · Accepted solution]

When you execute the macro for the first time using

%in(ABC_Time_check,19,Time_formats); 

z would resolve to 19 as that is 2nd value in the positional parameter  in the defining %macro statement

%macro in(program,z,data);

Now, let's move on to find out what %do loop resolves to 

Run this and see the log

%macro t;
%put set;
%do i=1 %to 19;/*z will resolve to 19*/
%put 	fmt&i._ ;
%end; 
%put %str(;);
%mend t;
%t

/*You will notice that loop generating list of dataset names fmt1_  to fmt19_

set 
fmt1_
fmt2_
fmt3_
fmt4_
fmt5_
fmt6_
fmt7_
fmt8_
fmt9_
fmt10_
fmt11_
fmt12_
fmt13_
fmt14_
fmt15_
fmt16_
fmt17_
fmt18_
fmt19_
;

I am sure you know set keyword followed by datsets list is a concatenation/append operation 

[34reqrwe]

if you compiled the macro, then this line

%in(ABC_Place_check,113,Place_formats);  

would call the macro, substituting values of  program=ABC_Place_check , z =113 , data=Place_formats

1) define the Workshop Libname

Libname Workshop "\\Pathway\data";

2) run the sas program \\Pathway\ABC_Place_check.sas

%include "\\Pathway\&program..sas";

 3) append the datasets FMT1_ , FMT2_, .... , FMT113_ together and save to a dataset called PLACE_FORMATS in the workshop libname.

data workshop.&data;
        length LABEL $ 200;
	set %do i=1 %to &z;
	fmt&i._ %end;;
	by FMTNAME START END LABEL;
run;

Try running the statement;

options symbolgen mlogic mprint;

before you run existing macro code, then look in the log . It should help you understand what is going on . 

[AMSAS]

You have a macro call "in" and it requires 3 parameters program, z & data 

The following line calls the macro in and passes the values into the macro variables:

program="ABC_Time_check"

z="19"

data="Time_formats"

%in(ABC_Time_check,19,Time_formats); 

Basically where you see any &<variable name> in the macro, the &<variable name> is replaced with the value of the macro variable thus:

%macro in(program,z,data); 
Libname Workshop "\\Pathway\data"; 
%include "\\Pathway\ABC_Time_check.sas"; 
data workshop.Time_formats; 
 length LABEL $ 200; 
 set %do i=1 %to 19 ; fmt&i._ %end;; 
 by FMTNAME START END LABEL; 
run; 
%mend in; %in(ABC_Time_check,19,Time_formats); 
%in(ABC_Place_check,113,Place_formats); 

The %do loop is going to iterate for the values 1 to 19 and resolve to generate the following set statement 

set fmt1_ fmt2_ fmt3_ ... fmt19_ ;

The macro is the equivalent of the following code:

Libname Workshop "\\Pathway\data";


%include "\\Pathway\ABC_Time_check.sas";

data workshop.Time_formats;
        length LABEL $ 200;
	set fmt1_ fmt2_ fmt3_ ... fmt_19 ;
	by FMTNAME START END LABEL;
run;

[r_behata]

Apparently the objective of code is to create SAS User Defined formats from Raw Data .

For More Information on creating the User Defined formats based on the SAS Datasets refer to:
http://support.sas.com/documentation/cdl/en/proc/65145/HTML/default/viewer.htm#n1e19y6lrektafn1kj6nb...

"Could someone let me know what the 'fmt&i._' "

&i is the counter that increments from 1 to 19 . For example when the first macro is called

%in(ABC_Time_check,19,Time_formats); 

fmt&i._ resolves to :

fmt1_
fmt2_
fmt3_
..
..
fmt19_

"refer to and the 'Z' is refer to something?  "

Z is the 2rd parameter to the macro, This is positional

%macro in(program,z,data);

which resolve to 19, because it is in the second place of the macro call.
%in(ABC_Time_check,19,Time_formats); .

"Also, does the 'Program' in the macro mean it need to run by using the 'data' before the do loop?"

every time you invoke themacro , You code is executing an external sas code before executing the data step.

Refer to \\Pathway\ABC_Time_check.sas and \\Pathway\ABC_Place_check.sas

Perhaps these sas codes create the datasets fmt1_ ..fmt19_ Etc.

If you want to display the contents of the External code in the current log use the following global option.

options source2;

[Tom]

Note that SAS allows ranges of dataset names when the suffix is a number. 

So IF you changed the names of your datasets so that the number was at the end.  So FMT_1 instead of FMT1_  then you could remove the %DO loop and just use :

set fmt_1 - fmt_&z ;

If you cannot change the names but you know that you want all of the datasets that start with FMT then perhaps you could use this code:

set FMT:  ;

[ybz12003]

Thank you so much for all of elucidation.