Hi, Will: You ask "Will I be encountering issues like this as I continue learning the base language?" Well, maybe. You had 2 "issues" initially. One of your original "issues" was that you tried to read data from your C: drive. As I explained the error message that you got, because your Unix server path was prepended to your C: drive location was a clue that you were either using a SAS OnDemand server or you were working in a locked down BI Server configuration. This only was an issue because you are using the SAS OnDemand for Academics server. And when you came to the forum for help, people who did not realize this limitation made some suggestions, like uploading your data to the server that will not work for you. The information about not being able to read data from your C: drive was available to you in the Commonly Asked Questions web site (http://support.sas.com/ondemand/caq_new.html). Another of your "issues" was that your FILENAME statement used a name that was too long (longer than 8 characters) and so, that "issue" was a rule that you should find in the Prep Guide. BTW, the Prep Guide is not meant to be your only study guide. The Base SAS Certification Prep Guide is meant primarily as a *refresher* for folks who have already taken Programming 1 and Programming 2 classes. And, they might have taken the classes a while ago and they need to refresh themselves before taking the certification exam. In the Programming 1 course, we talk about the limitations on the length of names that you use in the LIBNAME and FILENAME statements. Plus, Art sent you the documentation link. In my Prep Guide, on page 140, there is a note about the fact that the FILENAME statement should be 1-8 characters (see 2nd screen shot). I do not know what is loaded on the SAS OnDemand for Academics server. When I use the SAS OnDemand for Professionals server, there is a BOOKDATA folder (under the FILES folder). The BOOKDATA folder contains all the data that students are intended to use when studying for the exam using the Prep Guide. Every time you start a new job, you have new things to learn. What operating system are you using? How are you using SAS? What is your interface to SAS? What directories can you read from? What directories can you write to? What kind of data do you have? SAS data? Oracle data? DB2 data? CSV files? "Raw" data files? These are always "issues" that you will have whether you're using the Prep Guide or starting a new job or working with new data. This "issue" you will have to live with while you are using SAS OnDemand for Academics -- that SAS on your server is running on a Unix operating system. Many of the examples in the Prep Guide show Windows syntax. So you might see something like this in the Prep Guide: libname orion 'c:\workshop'; OR filename mydata 'c:\workshop\classfit.dat'; but those locations won't work for you for 2 reasons: 1) SAS is on a UNIX server and doesn't have a C: drive and UNIX systems use / instead of \ in a path name and 2) You can't read data from your C: drive because you are using SAS OnDemand for Academics. If you do have data on the server, then it might have a location like this: /home/<yourusername>/bookdata/sas_cert_prep_guides/classfit.dat and then your filename statement might be: filename mydata '/home/<yourusername>/bookdata/sas_cert_prep_guides/classfit.dat'; or filename mydata '~/bookdata/sas_cert_prep_guides/tests.dat'; So, you have to figure out whether the data you need is already loaded on the OnDemand server. If you were working with the SAS OnDemand for Professionals server, I know that the BOOKDATA folder has Prep Guide datasets and flat files. (Although I do not see data.txt in the folder when I look at my OnDemand for Professionals account.) But, it was my understanding that your professor would upload the data you needed to your class image on the server when you used SAS OnDemand for Academics. For questions about what data is on your SAS OnDemand for Academics server account and how to point to that data is something that you should ask of your professor or work with SAS Tech Support by sending mail to support@sas.com. I don't have an OnDemand for Academics account and I can't look at what is loaded on your account. But, I am posting a picture of what my SAS OnDemand for Professionals server list looks like and it shows the sas_cert_prep_guide folder with SAS datasets and other files. The forum is a wonderful resource and as you found out with your FILENAME statement, when you are asking syntax and coding questions, you will find a lot of help. Because your particular usage scenario is a special use case, you might want to work with Tech Support (as suggested in the Commonly Asked Questions) on data issues, such as how to find data or how to point to data. Specifically, with relation to the Prep Guide, you might look for some other postings like this one: https://communities.sas.com/message/197492#197492. Reading and writing Excel files will be an "issue" -- Microsoft doesn't install on Unix servers. So in the current OnDemand configuration, you cannot read or write Excel files. Many other students have this same "issue" -- they too have to study syntax that they can't run (primarily because Excel doesn't install on the mainframe, either). Overall, I think that if you focus more on the code, you will learn much about SAS coding and how powerful the DATA step is and how flexible SAS is when it comes to reading data and converting "raw" data into SAS datasets for analysis. cynthia
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