Date:         Mon, 28 Dec 2009 20:29:32 -0500
Reply-To:     Arthur Tabachneck <art297@NETSCAPE.NET>
Sender:       "SAS(r) Discussion" <SAS-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
From:         Arthur Tabachneck <art297@NETSCAPE.NET>
Subject:      Re: Fw: extracting numbers from a string
Comments: To: William Krause <wkrause2003@YAHOO.COM>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1

Bill,

The specific suggestions, and degree of complexity, will be a function of
what your data files "really" look like.

I took a shortcut, in the event that responses in tab2 actually might be
separated by a distinguishable character (like a comma).

If they are, something as simple as the following might suffice:

data tab1;
  informat question $10.;
  informat infmt $5.;
  informat response $50.;
  input question   infmt response;
  cards;
question1  1.    1="test1",2="test2",3="test3"
question2  2.    1="test1",2="test2",3="test3",11="test11",13="test13"
question3  2.    1="test1",2="test2",3="test3",11="test11",13="test13"
;

data tab2;
  informat question $10.;
  informat resp_results $50.;
  input question   resp_results;
  cards;
question1   1
question2   13
question3   5
;

proc sort data=tab1;
  by question;
run;

proc sort data=tab2;
  by question;
run;

data want;
  merge tab1 tab2 (in=b);
  by question;
  if b;
  resp=inputn(resp_results,infmt);
  valid="false";
  do i=1 to 5;
    if resp eq inputn(scan(scan(response,i,","),1,"="),infmt)
     then valid="true";
  end;
run;

HTH,
Art
-------
On Mon, 28 Dec 2009 14:08:21 -0800, William Krause <wkrause2003@YAHOO.COM>
wrote:

>--- On Mon, 12/28/09, William Krause <wkrause2003@YAHOO.COM> wrote:
>
>
>From: William Krause <wkrause2003@YAHOO.COM>
>Subject: extracting numbers from a string
>To: SAS-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>Cc: "William Krause" <wkrause2003@YAHOO.COM>
>Date: Monday, December 28, 2009, 1:45 PM
>
>
>I have a metadata table (tab1)that contains a field(infmt) which is the
>informat of a another field(response).� The response field contains the
>response number and its assigned description.
>
>tab1
>question���infmt response
>question1� 1.� � 1="test1"2="test2"3="test3"
>question2� 2.� � 1="test1"2="test2"3="test3"11="test11"13="test13"
>question3� 2.� � 1="test1"2="test2"3="test3"11="test11"13="test13"
>
>Then I have a second table (tab2) which contains the actual response values
>in a field (resp_results)
>
>tab2
>question���resp_results
>question1���1
>question2���13
>question3���5
>
>How do I insure that the resp_results in tab2 matches the informat of the
>infmt field and matches a valid response number from the response field in
>tab1?
>
>Thanks for you assistance.
>
>Bill K.
>wkrause2003@yahoo.com
>