We're experimenting with a SAS server configured for UTF-8 encoding alongside our standard configuration that uses Wlatin1. One very strange thing I came across was that a dataset that had been created using the standard Wlatin encoding produced an error message when reading it on the UTF-8 server.   ERROR: Some character data was lost during transcoding in the dataset ADAM.ADLB. Either the data contains characters that are not representable in the new encoding or truncation occurred during transcoding.   Other datasets gave no such problems. I checked the datasets using proc contents. The datsets used the Wlatin1 encoding and had  been compressed using the CHAR method.    The problem could be solved by using the dataset option "encoding=any" or "encoding=utf8". But I would really like to know why the error only occurred in one dataset and not in others. Is this just something random? The dataset in question contained lab data and had symbols such as mu (the Wlatin1 version 'B5'x as opposed to ^{unicode 03BC}). Could that explain it?     ... View more

I use Enterprise Guide with SAS 9.4 on a server and the X command (thankfully) enabled. But a few weeks ago, I ran into an issue with the X command, EG would freeze and wouldn't exit normally.   I tracked this down to a configuration program that connected a network drive using x "net use p: \\server\share"; This connected a network drive for my personal use, based on my userid. A few days earlier, my userid had changed and what seems to have happened is that the Windows server sent a prompt whether the "persistent" drive letter should be attached to a different network share. That prompt went to the SAS server console, it never reached me and of course I couldn't respond, Disabling the X command for this drive letter fixed the problem but I wanted to be able to safely use that drive.     The solution I'm using now is to use an infile statement with a pipe option:     data _null_; infile "net use /y p: \\nlwagefs00\private\&sysuserid" pipe; input; put _infile_; run; (This is based on a post to SAS-L by Tom Abernathy, thread "SAS loses focus on X/call system invocation")   This method writes the results of the shell command to the SAS log. If anything went wrong, you can read it there. I've tested it with a mis-spelled share name and in that case, the log will report "Stderr output: System error 53 has occurred. The network path was not found."   Perhaps others will find this method useful as well. I'm interested to know if this construction could fail in some way or another. I'd also like to know if there's any further documention on this method. Googling for "_null_", "pipe", "infile" doesn't produce helpful results. The SAS 9.4 help for the infile statement states "PIPE: specifies an unnamed pipe. Note: Some operating environments do not support pipes." Not very helpful.   ... View more

I'm experimenting with PROC DOCUMENT to merge output results to a single document with a table of contents but I've run into some problems. The biggest problem relates to tites in SAS/Graph output. I create my output using ODS RTF using the NOGTITLE NOGFOOTNOTE options and do the same when creating the merged document with PROC DOCUMENT. But in the merged document, the title is printed both inside and outside the graph. If I use PROC GREPLAY  then I see the title is included in the Graph. Is there any way to stop this? Problem 2: If I use ODS RTF to create the merged document then page numbering is wrong, "page 1" is numbered twice, then page numbering commences normally. Is there any solution to this? Problem 3: Using TAGSETS.RTF, page numbering is correct, after selecting all in Word and pressing F9 to update all fields. But now, the second page is blank! Any help on this? These are the sample programs I used (with SAS 9.4 on a Windows 2008 server and using Enterprise Guide): T1.SAS ods document name=odsdoc.t1(write); ods rtf file = "&_outrtf\&_progname..rtf" toc_data; title1 h=8pt "Test program &_progname..SAS" j=r "Page ^{thispage} of ^{lastpage}";; title2 h=8pt "OR sales data"; footnote h=8pt j=l "&_progname" j=r "&sysdate9."; ods proclabel="OR sales data"; proc report data =sashelp.orsales( obs = 5 ) nowindows;     columns year quarter product_line; run; ods _all_ close; ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- T2,sas ods document name=odsdoc.t2(write); ods rtf file = "&_outrtf\&_progname..rtf" toc_data; title1 h=8pt "Test program &_progname..SAS" j=r "Page ^{thispage} of ^{lastpage}";; title2 h=8pt "Shoes data"; footnote h=8pt j=l "&_progname" j=r "&sysdate9."; ods proclabel="Shoes data"; proc report data =sashelp.shoes( obs = 5 ) nowindows;     columns region product stores; run; ods _all_ close; ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- T3,sas ods document name=odsdoc.t3(write); ods rtf file = "&_outrtf\&_progname..rtf" toc_data; title1 h=8pt "Test program &_progname..SAS" j=r "Page ^{thispage} of ^{lastpage}";; title2 h=8pt "Class data"; footnote h=8pt j=l "&_progname" j=r "&sysdate9."; ods proclabel="Class data"; proc report data =sashelp.class( obs = 5 ) nowindows     style(column header)=[font_size=8pt]; run; ods _all_ close; ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- T4,sas ods document name=odsdoc.t4(write); ods rtf file = "&_outrtf\&_progname..rtf" toc_data nogtitle nogfootnote; goptions ftext='Arial' ftitle='Arial/bold'; title1 h=8pt "Test program &_progname..SAS" j=r "Page ^{thispage} of ^{lastpage}";; title2 h=8pt 'Scatter Plot of Height and Weight'; footnote h=8pt j=l "&_progname" j=r "&sysdate9."; ods proclabel='Scatter Plot of Height and Weight'; proc gplot data=sashelp.class gout=odsdoc.gseg;     plot height* weight = sex;     run; quit; ods _all_ close; ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Replay,sas ods output documents=documents; proc document;     doc library=odsdoc; run; quit; ods output close; proc sql;     select name into :docs separated by ' ' from documents order by name; quit; %put &docs; %let _publish=&_progdir\..\65 Publish Results; goptions vsize=10cm hsize=15cm ftext='Arial' ftitle='Arial/bold'; options orientation=portrait gstyle; ods tagsets.rtf file="&_publish\&_progname..rtf" nogtitle nogfootnote     options(toc_data='yes' contents='yes' TOC_LEVEL='1'); %macro replay;     %local i currdoc;     %let i=1;     %let currdoc=%scan(&docs,&i,%str( ));     %do %while (%length(&currdoc) gt 0);         proc document name=&currdoc;             replay;         run;         quit;         %let i=%eval(&i+1);         %let currdoc=%scan(&docs,&i,%str( ));     %end; %mend; %replay; ods _all_ close; ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Any help is greatly appreciated! _gp ... View more

With the file path of a SAS program file, you can automate a lot of things like libnames, macro autocall libraries, output destinations. The full file path name is available in Enterprise Guide, but only if the programs are stored on the server. I can save a SAS program on the server in the "Save As" dialog, in that case macro variable &_SASPROGRAMFILE contains the path name, e.g. "C:\Users\<user name> \Documents\My SAS Files\9.4\<SAS program>.sas". I'm not a SAS administrator but apparently, a directory on the server is reserved for each user. This is the "Files" location you can see on the "Server List" pane, below the libraries. But that's not really what we need, it has to be possible to access the SAS programs with Windows Explorer. So using the instructioons on http://bi-notes.com/2012/06/best-practice-for-centralized-user-storage/ out SAS administrator specified the "Files" location as a network share. However, it turns out that if you open a SAS program from that network share, that &_SASPROGRAMFILE is still empty. If you right-click the program from the "Project Tree" pane and select "Properties", it will report the correct location of the file, this is the case whether or not the program is on the "Files" location. Only if you open the file from the server does &_SASPROGRAMFILE contain the correct file path. Interestingly, if you now right-click the program and look at properties, it reports "<SAS program>.sas [SASApp]". So my question is, is there a way to derive the path name of a SAS program in EG if a file is simply opened from Windows Explorer? I've looked at the EG startup options, there doesn't seem to be anything to tell EG to ooen the file on the server. Perhaps EG could be scripted to derive the file path from a program's properties? Any other suggestions? I'm using EG 6.1 under Windows 7 and SAS 9.4 on a Windows 2008 R2 server. ... View more