Another alternative is to use the "set" syntax of the insert statement: proc sql; insert into test2 set load_dt = today(); quit; In addition, I don't think there are any circumstances in which the insert statement allows "as" or "format=" as you have in your OP. ... View more

Thank you Ksharp, this code is very helpful. ... View more

Just treat name like you do adm_date and dis_date. In other words: 1. Add name to your proc sort: proc sort data=have;  by name adm_date dis_date; run; 2. In the keep statement for data want, get rid of: name1-name&maxnum and just keep name. 3. In data want, delete all references to name1-name&maxnum and the array namvals. 4. In data want, add name to the by statement just like in the proc sort. That should do it. ... View more

Thank you all for your valuable suggestions. Regards. Sanjeev.K ... View more

Thanks, Cynthia. I knew you'd know, so I purposely tagged you in my "Oops, I figured it out" reply, in the hopes you'd see that and not waste your time with a response to my OP. Anyway, thanks as always for your wisdom. Now if I could just figure out a general way to do green bar shading without pre-processing the data, I might actually come to like Proc Tabulate. Karl ... View more

Without doubt, the best solution is Proc SQL with the EXCEPT set operator. For a DATA step solution without the need for sorting, here is a simple hash solution (using the plural forms of the variable names): data setc;      declare hash a(dataset:"seta",ordered:"a");      a.defineKey("dates","keys");      a.defineDone();      do until(done);           set setb end=done;           if a.check() ne 0 then output;      end;      stop; run; ... View more

SUCCESS!!!! Using you logic, but simplifying it a little more I did this and it resolves correctly. call symput (Table, "'"||DatetimeStamp||"'"); Thank you both for your responses. ... View more

Thanks FriedEgg, very interesting approach.. And I had no idea the usage of coalesce, its so usefull. ... View more

You are correct.  I amended the statement by adding the strip function. nmbstrip=strip(number); new_number=substring(nmbstrip,1,length(nmbstrip)-2); run; Thanks. ... View more

Great, glad to hear it. By the way, in my example, I have "j=c" in the title line with the graphic. You probably don't need that. I realize now that I took this example from some existing code which used a style with left-aligned titles. Under normal circumstances, your titles (included preimaged graphics) will be centered by default. Just an FYI. Karl ... View more

I would like to thank you all. Kind regards Nikos ... View more