ERROR 388-185: Expecting an arithmetic operator.

[rylife]

Original Code

Data scoredata_ifthen;
set scoredata0;
TotalScore= sum(score1, score2, score3);
AverageScore= mean(score1, score2, score3);
/* Using the IF...THEN...statement*/
IF gender ='m' THEN gender_num=1;
IF score1 NE. AND score2 NE. AND score3 NE. THEN take='complete';
IF AverageScore GE 90 THEN DO;
grade= 'A';
pass= 'pass';
END;
run;

After running code

OPTIONS NONOTES NOSTIMER NOSOURCE NOSYNTAXCHECK;

72

73 Data scoredata_ifthen;

74 set scoredata0;

75 TotalScore= sum(score1, score2, score3);

76 AverageScore= mean(score1, score2, score3);

77 /* Using the IF...THEN...statement*/

78 IF gender ='m' THEN gender_num=1;

79 IF score1 NE. AND score2 NE. AND score3 NE. THEN take='complete';

___

388

201

76

ERROR 388-185: Expecting an arithmetic operator.

ERROR 201-322: The option is not recognized and will be ignored.

ERROR 76-322: Syntax error, statement will be ignored.

80 IF AverageScore GE 90 THEN DO;

81 grade= 'A';

82 pass= 'pass';

83 END;

84 run;

[novinosrin · Accepted solution]

correction;

you missed a blank in NE.  that is between NE and .

IF score1 NE . AND score2 NE . AND score3 NE . THEN take='complete';

Your original code below

IF score1 NE. AND score2 NE. AND score3 NE. THEN take='complete';

is causing tokenizaion problem at compile time

[rylife]

Thank you!

[Amir]

@novinosrin has identified the issue and corrective action.

As an alternative, one can also make use of the missing function, e.g.:

if not missing(score1) and not missing(score2) and not missing(score3) then take='complete';

or, in your specific case, the nmiss function could also be of help, as it counts the number of missing numeric values, e.g.:

if nmiss(score1,score2,score3) eq 0 then take='complete';

Regards,

Amir.

[rylife]

Thank you!

[ballardw]

If you want to do something when all values of numeric values are present you might want to consider the NMISS function instead of a bunch of If this and that and somethinelse comparisons:

If Nmiss(Score1, score2, score3) = 0 then take='complete';

if you have a lot of value you can even use list notation to reduce coding such as:

if nmiss( of score1-score25) =0 then take='complete';

which would certainly be a whole lot easier than 25 AND comparisons.

[rylife]

Thank you, this will be useful once I use larger data sets.