Date:         Tue, 8 Jul 2003 18:34:47 -0400
Reply-To:     Sigurd Hermansen <HERMANS1@WESTAT.COM>
Sender:       "SAS(r) Discussion" <SAS-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
From:         Sigurd Hermansen <HERMANS1@WESTAT.COM>
Subject:      Re: PROC SUMMARY Failure
Comments: To: Kevin Myers <KevinMyers@austin.rr.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"

The 'valid output statement' phrase differs from anything that I can recall
seeing. I have not, however, tried to overwrite the source dataset with the
output of PROC SUMMARY. Perhaps SAS V8.2 is trying to protect less wary
users against loss of data.

You may have to resort to a SAS SQL query as a workaround. If you ask SAS
SQL to shoot you in the foot, it will gladly optimize the process. ;>

Sig

-----Original Message-----
From: Kevin Myers [mailto:WHMyers@CABLEONE.NET]
Sent: Tuesday, July 08, 2003 4:43 PM
To: SAS-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: PROC SUMMARY Failure


Howdy Folks,

As some of you may recall, using PROC SUMMARY in the following way used to
work up through early V8.2 at least.  Note that there is no VAR statement,
and the input data set has no numeric variables.  I have used this method
many times over the years in order to obtain a simple list of all
combinations of class variable values:

proc summary data=Country missing nway order=freq;
   class IHSCountryCode DSCountryId CountryName CountryAbbr;
   output out=Country;
   run;

However, I now receive the following error message (SAS 8.2 with all?
hotfixes under Win 2K):

ERROR: Neither the PRINT option nor a valid output statement has been given.

This or some similar message used to be produced under equivalent
circumstances when using PROC MEANS, but NOT when using PROC SUMMARY
(despite what the docs might lead you to believe to the contrary).  Has
someone changed this PROC SUMMARY behavior on purpose???  If so, this is
going to break LOTS of existing programs!!!

If anyone can see some stupid mistake that I'm making, or has any
information regarding this apparant change in behavior, I'd really
appreciate it.  Thanks!

s/KAM