I agree that it is useful to employ a program to write the code that would set these 5000 or so files. I also like Richards first step where he uses the SQL dictionary.tables to construct a list of the datasets which need to be employed for the set operation. I think there is a simpler solution for writing the code that executes the set operation. I would employ CALL EXECUTE in a _null_ datastep to place code in a stack to be executed after the _null_ datastep completes. I would note that only a single _null_ datastep is needed.

data _null_; set listoftables end=end; if _n_=1 then do; call execute("data stacked;"); call execute("set"); end; call execute(compress(library || '.' || memname)); if end then do; call execute(";"); call execute("run;"); end; run;

HTH,

Dale

--- "Richard A. DeVenezia" <radevenz@IX.NETCOM.COM> wrote: > SUBSCRIBE SAS-L Anonymous. wrote: > > Dear All: > > > > I have about 5000 SAS data files, 4 for each day, and going > from > > Jan 1999 to 2003 Dec...The dates on these files are in the format > > f20000703_110000; f20000703_120000; f20000703_130000; and so on... > > f20000703 stands for the date -- July 3, 2000; and the 110000 > stands > > for the hour. I want to merge all of these files to create one > > dataset. Each of the files have the same variables and have the > same > > format....Can Somebody please help me. > > Due to number of table, I would write a program that writes the > program. > untested... > > proc sql; > create tables listoftables as select memname from > dictionary.tables where > libname = "<libname>" > and memname like 'f%' > ; > > filename stack catalog 'work.merge.ftables.source'; > > data _null_; > set listoftables end=end; > file stack; > if _n_ = 1 then put 'set'; > put libname '.' +(-1) libname 'in=(_' _n_ ')'; > if end then put ';' > run; > > data _null_; > set listoftables; > file stack mod; > put 'if _' _n_ 'then source="' libname '.' +(-1) memname '"; else'; > if end then put ';' > run; > > data stacked; > %include stack; > run; > > filename stack; > > -- > Richard A. DeVenezia > http://www.devenezia.com/downloads/sas/macros/?m=xmlib

===== --------------------------------------- Dale McLerran Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center mailto: dmclerra@fhcrc.org Ph: (206) 667-2926 Fax: (206) 667-5977 ---------------------------------------

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