scan function

[sanyam13]

data test; 

x  =  'charles dickens' ;

y =scan (x ,2 ) ;

run;

length of scan function is said to be 200 , then why i am getting the length of y as 15 . substr function takes the length of input function is scan function also working like this ? please help . 

[PaigeMiller]

Please read the SAS 9.4 documentation at http://documentation.sas.com/?docsetId=lefunctionsref&docsetTarget=p0jshdjy2z9zdzn1h7k90u99lyq6.htm&...

which says 

In a DATA step, if the SCAN function returns a value to a variable that has not yet been given a length, that variable is given the length of the first argument. This behavior is different from the behavior in previous releases of SAS. In previous releases, code that created a variable with a length of 200 might have produced a variable with a length that was greater than expected. If you need the SCAN function to assign a variable with a value that is different from the length of the first argument, use a LENGTH statement.

[VDD]

because Y takes the lenght of X since Y was not declared until you assigned Y to scan X

[VDD]

data test; 

lenght y $200;

x  =  'charles dickens' ;

y =scan (x ,2 ) ;

run;