Well, if your stuck in a situation where you have some Excel file in which you need to place certain data in different places, then my recommendation would be to do the necessary programming in Excel.  Use SAS to create an output file, CSV or XLSX.  Then create VBA macro to import and process the data.  Its very simple VBA (Visual Basic for Applications) and there are hundreds of examples out there for any possible scenario you want.  You then have full access to the full Office Object (ie. the entire Office suite): http://www.zerrtech.com/content/excel-vba-open-csv-file-and-import https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/office/aa221353(v=office.11).aspx http://www.excel-easy.com/vba/loop.html The reason is that SAS produces outputs, and data transfer files.  You are trying to use an output file as more than that, perhaps as dashboard, or other application.  It something I see a lot of, I need to do word processing, open Excel, need to do databasing, open Excel, need to paint my new masterpiece, you guessed it - open Excel.  Its probably the most abused software available today. ... View more