Date:         Thu, 27 Jul 2006 08:07:26 +0100
Reply-To:     Guido T <cymraegerict@GMAIL.COM>
Sender:       "SAS(r) Discussion" <SAS-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
From:         Guido T <cymraegerict@GMAIL.COM>
Subject:      Re: Concatenating character values?
Comments: To: Eric B <emblabac@hotmail.com>
In-Reply-To:  <1153865478.073979.267910@75g2000cwc.googlegroups.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed

On 25/07/06, Eric B <emblabac@hotmail.com> wrote:
> Its actually pretty easy. Simply
> new_var = a || "/" || b || "/" || c;
> Use the COMPRESS function if you have extra blanks lurking around.
> Hope that helps.
> Eric B
>
Hi Eric,

The problem with using

    new_var = a || "/" || b || "/" || c;

Is that if the defined length of the component character variables is
greater or equal to the length of NEW_VAR then the resulting string
will just be the conents of A.

For example ...

5107  data test;
5108      length new_var a b c $200;
5109      a = 'a';
5110      b = 'b';
5111      c = 'c';
5112      new_var = a||'/ '||b||'/ '||c;
5113      put new_var=;
5114      cmp_var = compbl(a||'/  '||b||'/  '||c);
5115      put cmp_var=;
5116  run;

new_var=a
cmp_var=a / b / c

The defined length is used in concatenating the strings, so the first
'/' is added to the end of character variable A which contains 'a'
followed by 199 spaces (sort of).
So the '/' is beyond the end of the string.

When you use COMPRESS or the COMPBL functions, the work string is a
long as it needs to be before the spaces are removed.  So in this case
the 602 character long work string is compressed before bing returned
to CMP_VAR.

The version 8 solution would be ...

   new_var = compress(a||'/ '||b||'/ '||c);

or

   new_var = trim(a)||'/'||trim(b)||'/'||trim(c);

In  version 9 the solution would be to use the CATX function ...

   cmp_var = catx('/', a, b, c);

The CATX function removes the leading and trailing spaces from the
strings and then concatenates the string with the delimiter between
them.
A much neater solution.

Regards
++ Guido