Command line arguments in SAS / SAS System Options

Most often than not, we tend to run the SAS program in command lines. If the SAS is present in UNIX, we open a client terminal like PuTTY or SSH terminal and invoke the SAS program. If the SAS is present in Windows, then we can do the same by opening command mode.

The sytax for invoking the SAS Program is as follows:

sas <path and program-name>.sas

We need to make sure that the path of sas executable is present in the PATH enviroinment variable.

What is more interesting are the other command line arguments that we can pass while invoking a SAS program as mentioned above in the command line. Below, I've tried to illustrate each of them with the sytax and usage detail:

• SYSPARM: This is the most useful option that I have come across. This lets us send parameters to the SAS programs through the command line prompt. The value of the SYSPARM is saved under the macro variable- SYSPARM, which can be accessed within the program. For Example, the below code - class.sas lets us send the age as a parameter while invoking the SAS Program.

     %put &sysparm;

     proc print data=sashelp.class noobs;

     where age=&sysparm.;

     run;

           We can invoke the SAS program in the command mode as follows:

           sas class.sas -sysparm "14"

    One can even send a list of key-value pair values through the program which will feed-in to a macro.

• LOG: This option would redirect the log file to the specified location instead of the default location.

          Usage:     sas class.sas -log "~/temp.log"

• WORK: This would help us specify the work directory location instead of the default work place.

I also found that SAS 9.3 has come up with new options to use Checkpoint Mode and Restart Mode for Labeled Code Sections if the program has terminated in the middle and if we need to restart it from a specific point onwards. More to come in this in the next post!

Let me know your thoughts!

Creating a search engine in SAS

Its the age of the search engine! I remember people "yahoo"ing during the late 90's and "Google"ing till the late 2k's and now "Bing"ing.

I just wondered.. Why not SAS? So I started off by doing some reading on the yahoo search engine API's. They have new API released, called as the BOSS. Its documentation is provided here: http://developer.yahoo.com/search/boss/boss_guide/

Next step was to fetch a api key which was generated after i filled out their form. Using this, i could start accessing their BOSS api...

I used the proc http to access the BOSS api using the program below:

filename in "C:\test\curr_in";
filename out "C:\test\curr_out.txt";

data _null_;
title;
if (_N_ eq 1) then do;
 file stdout;
 infile stdin;
 put @1 "Enter the search text:";
 input n $;
 var='appid=xxxxxxx&query='||compress(n)||'&results=1';
 file in;
 put var $;
end;
run;


proc http in=in out=out url="http://search.yahooapis.com/WebSearchService/V1/webSearch" method="post" ct="application/x-www-form-urlencoded";
run;

The above program picks the input from the user, which would be the text that needs to be searched; creates a file curr_in which contains the parameter that needs to be sent out to the BOSS api and posts it to the api using the proc http procedure.

Note that the api key has been typed as xxxx which can be replaced by the api key that you would generate from the developer.yahoo.com site.

Once the program is executed, we can see that the output of the api has been dumped into the curr_out file, which contains the search result in the form of XML. This xml is then parsed using the suitable mechanism to fetch the needed fields and then output it to the stdout. This is accomplished by the below code:

data new;
infile out lrecl=10000 truncover;
input @1 rec $1000.;
if(index(rec,'<Summary>')>0) then do;
 title= substr(rec,index(rec,'<Title>')+7,index(rec,'</Title>')-(index(rec,'<Title>')+7));
 summary=substr(rec,index(rec,'<Summary>')+9,index(rec,'</Summary>')-(index(rec,'<Summary>')+9));
 url = substr(rec,index(rec,'<Url>')+5,index(rec,'</Url>')-(index(rec,'<Url>')+5));
 output;
end;
run;
data _null_;
set new;
file stdout;
put "Title: " title;
put "Summary: " summary;
put "Url: " url;
run;

This produces the output as shown below:

Let me know your feedback/comments!

SAS Global forum 2011 Videos

Hello!

For all of those who are unable to attend the SAS Global forum 2011, here is the way to catch up from your workplace/home:
http://www.sas.com/apps/webnet/video-sharing.html?c=072802BD-8501-47AF-A5D8-365B978A2517&height=520&width=800&referralPage=http://support.sas.com/events/sasglobalforum/2011/

Using SAS as my makeshift alarm: Using sound function

I have trouble waking up early everyday. And the days when i forget to set alarm in my mobile, I might wake up two days later!!

I've overcome this problem after i discovered this the sound function in SAS. This function produces a beep sound for the specified frequency and time which are to be supplied as the arguments.

Now, lets see how we make the conventional alarm sound which would ring for 20 times:

data _null_;
do j=1 to 20;
   do i=1 to 4;
      sound(550,500);
   end;
   sleep(1000);
end;
run;

Now, if we schedule this code in a windows scheduler to run everyday at some designated time, SAS would take up the task of waking you up everyday.

I use this sound function more often at the end of my long running programs. It would beep after the completion of the program (yes.. pretty similar to the oven) so that we could do the needful actions.

Just to note that this is possible only with the Windows SAS and the sound function does not work in UNIX/Mainframes.

I would like to end this post by sharing with you, a brilliant application of this sound/sleep function: the composition of the "Ol Mac Donald" Song:

http://www2.sas.com/proceedings/sugi29/048-29.pdf

So.. Let the music begin!!!

SASopedia gets a face lift

I know it was high time I did it... Hope this is more viewable...

Watch out for more posts in this space...

Making SAS Interactive (Part 2): Using %window and %display

Its the world of GUI. And you are left nowhere if you don't provide the users, the luxury (or rather fulfill the basic needs) of giving a Graphical User Interface. This holds good even for SAS.

SAS came up with the tool called SAS/AF and SAS EG which provides the users with a brilliant GUI and thus making their lives so eeaasssy.. However, not many of us would have bumped into this brilliant macro tool called %WINDOW and %DISPLAY which is present in BASE SAS9 which satisfies the basic needs of having a GUI. Here I take a small dive into the SAS ocean again, exploring the functionalities of these two macros.

%WINDOW: This creates the basic window that needs to be popped up upon execution. We can specify the window attributes here like the color/width/height,etc. You could also specify the position of the text that is to be displayed and the input parameters that are to be read.

%DISPLAY: This actually invokes the window that has been defined in the %window program.

Below is a simple illustration of the %window and %display invocation:

%window test_win color=blue

/*dimension for the window*/
icolumn=15 irow=10
columns=90 rows=45

/*Content of the window*/
#3 @25 "My Window"
attr = rev_video
#5 @10 "Hello Pramod"
attr = underline
;

%display test_win;

The above code displays the output as shown below:

Below, I've demonstrated how we can use this to make SAS interactive. Most of the code is self explanatory, of course with a bit of help from the support.sas.com documentation available at: http://support.sas.com/documentation/cdl/en/mcrolref/61885/HTML/default/viewer.htm#a000206734.htm

/* Main window */

%window final color=gray

/*dimension for the window*/
icolumn=15 irow=10
columns=90 rows=75

/*Content of the window*/
#1 @25 "&error_msg"
#3 @15 "Hi &sysuserid." attr = rev_video color=blue @60 "Date: &sysdate9." attr = rev_video color=blue
#5 @25 "Welcome to the Reporting World" attr = rev_video
#8 @35 "Report List"
#11 @15 "1. Class listing" @50 "2. Class Report by Gender"
#13 @15 "3. Class Report by Age" @50 "4. Class freq"
#16 @15 "Enter your Choice:" @35 choice attr=underline
;

/* End of Window Final */

%macro execute;
%let choice=;%display final;

%if &choice=1 %then %do;
 proc print data=sashelp.class noobs;
 run;
%end;%else %if &choice=2 %then %do;
 proc report data=sashelp.class nowd;
 columns sex height weight;
 define sex / group;
 define height /analysis;
 define weight / analysis;
 run;
%end;%else %if &choice=3 %then %do;
 proc report data=sashelp.class nowd;
 columns age height weight;
 define age / group;
 define height /analysis;
 define weight / analysis;
 run;
%end;%else %if &choice=4 %then %do;
 proc freq data=sashelp.class;
 tables sex*age /nocum nopercent;
 run;%end;
%mend execute;

%execute
In the above code, I first display a list of things the use might be interested to see in the %window, and then %display this inside the macro execute. I also read his input into the macro variable choice and then based on his selection, I call the required procedure inside the macro execute.

The output of the above code is as shown below:

Upon entering the value 2 and hitting the enter button, we get the output as shown:

You could experiment more on this and let me know your suggestions/thoughts/ideas...

Making SAS Interactive (Part 1): Using stdin and stdout

Many a times, we may come across a need for having a dynamic programs. Meaning, we may need the user to key in the input and run the code accordingly, based on his input. This can be achieved in SAS by using the automatic file descriptors: stdin and stdout. This is more widely used in UNIX environment, especially when we batch submit the code in the command line.

In the below code, I illustrate the use of stdin and stdout by implementing a simple calculator, which takes in the numbers and the operators as the arguments and outputs the results.

data test;
if (_N_ eq 1) then do;
 file stdout;
 infile stdin;
 put @1 "Enter the first variable:";
 input X @;
 put @1 "Enter the second variable:";
 input Y @;
 put @1 "Choose the operator: + - * / **:";
 input op $;
end;
retain X Y op;
select (op);
 when ('+') result=X+Y;
 when ('-') result=X-Y;
 when ('*') result=X*Y;
 when ('/') result=X/Y;
 when ('**') result=X**Y;
 otherwise ;
end;
put "The result is:" result;
run;

In the above code, I've redirected the infile and file statements to the stdin and stdout respectively. So the input is always read through the terminal key and the output is always written to the terminal.

When we run the above code in the batch mode, we get the following output:

We can also route the output of a procedure into the terminal using the proc printo as shown below:

proc printto print=stdout;
run;

The below code would output all the details of the student whose name is keyed in the terminal for the sashelp.class dataset:

data name;
title;
if (_N_ eq 1) then do;
 file stdout;
 infile stdin;
 put @1 "Enter the student name:";
 input n $;
end;
retain n;
call symput('name',n);
run;
proc printto print=stdout;
run;
options nodate nonumber;
proc print data=sashelp.class noobs;
where name="&name";
run;

This would give us the below output:

Let me know if you guys have any thoughts or other approaches.

More to come: Making SAS Iinteractive (Part 2): Using window prompts