%let statements and symbolic reference not resolved

[sophia_SAS]

Dear SAS users,

I am a beginner user to SAS macros.  I would like to start with simple %let statements.  Below is my data step with the %let.  Please advise as to how I can fix the error.  The error message from sas is below the data step.

Thank you! let

%let group=1;

data s&group_1;  (dataset name should be called s1_1)

set s&group_2;  (dataset name should be called s1_2)

run;

924  %let group=1;

WARNING: Apparent symbolic reference GROUP_1 not resolved.

925  data s&group_1;

           -

           22

           200

ERROR 22-322: Syntax error, expecting one of the following: a name, a quoted string, (, /, ;,

              _DATA_, _LAST_, _NULL_.

ERROR 200-322: The symbol is not recognized and will be ignored.

[Linlin]

change

data s&group_1;

to

data s&group._1;

[Haikuo]

Macro variable resolves in the unit called 'token'. There are some default boundaries for tokens, but '_' was not one of them, macro processor will try to resolve 'group_1' instead of 'group'.So you need to manually add in your boundaries to define your token, namely '.'

Try this:

%let group=1;

data s&group._1; (dataset name should be called s1_1)

set s&group._2; (dataset name should be called s1_2)

run;

Regards,

Haikuo