Date:         Wed, 24 May 2006 04:35:59 -0400
Reply-To:     Jim Groeneveld <jim2stat@YAHOO.CO.UK>
Sender:       "SAS(r) Discussion" <SAS-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
From:         Jim Groeneveld <jim2stat@YAHOO.CO.UK>
Subject:      Re: extract a string separated by '-'
Comments: To: Kitty Lee <lee.kitty@YAHOO.COM>

Dear Kitty,

You can SCAN and delimit text parts by both the '-' and the ' ' at the same
time as in:

1          DATA _NULL_;
2            Value  = '100101 - 100203';
3            First  = SCAN ( Value, 1 );
4            Second = SCAN ( Value, 2 );
5            PUT First= Second=;
6            First  = SCAN ( Value, 1, ' -' );
7            Second = SCAN ( Value, 2, ' -' );
8            PUT First= Second=;
9          RUN;

First=100101 Second=100203
First=100101 Second=100203

Note that the delimiting characters already contain the space and the dash
by default and that consecutive delimiters count as a single one!

Regards - Jim.
--
Jim Groeneveld, Netherlands
Statistician, SAS consultant
home.hccnet.nl/jim.groeneveld



On Tue, 23 May 2006 21:02:54 -0400, Kitty Lee <lee.kitty@YAHOO.COM> wrote:

>Thanks Dan & Toby!! I just learned a new function "scan" :-)
>
>K.
>
>On Tue, 23 May 2006 17:58:51 -0700, Nordlund, Dan (DSHS)
><NordlDJ@DSHS.WA.GOV> wrote:
>
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: SAS(r) Discussion [mailto:SAS-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On Behalf Of Kitty
>>> Lee
>>> Sent: Tuesday, May 23, 2006 5:50 PM
>>> To: SAS-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>>> Subject: extract a string separated by '-'
>>>
>>> Hi. I have a question about extracting caseid
>>>
>>> My current variable, CASEID has two components separated by '-'. It looks
>>> like this:
>>>
>>>      CaseID
>>> 100101 - 100203
>>> 100101 - 1002834
>>> 10020 - 100390
>>> 1003044 - 10023045
>>>
>>> I wonder how can I separate out the two columns to become something like:
>>>
>>> CaseID_1     CaseID_2
>>>
>>> 100101        100203
>>> 100101        1002834
>>> 10020         100390
>>> 1003044       10023045
>>>
>>> I can't use simple substr(string, start, length) because the length of the
>>> CaseIDs varies. The only clear separator is '-'.
>>>
>>> Thanks. :-)
>>>
>>> K.
>>
>>Kitty,
>>
>>You can use the SCAN function.  Try something like the following:
>>
>>data test;
>>  input CaseID $1-25;
>>cards;
>> 100101 - 100203
>> 100101 - 1002834
>> 10020 - 100390
>> 1003044 - 10023045
>>;
>>run;
>>data test2;
>>  length CaseID_1 CaseID_2 $15;
>>  set test;
>>  CaseID_1=compress(scan(CaseID,1,'-'));
>>  CaseID_2=compress(scan(CaseID,2,'-'));
>>run;
>>proc print;
>>run;
>>
>>Hope this is helpful,
>>
>>Dan
>>
>>Daniel J. Nordlund
>>Research and Data Analysis
>>Washington State Department of Social and Health Services
>>Olympia, WA  98504-5204