Date:         Wed, 19 Jun 1996 01:53:00 GMT
Reply-To:     Mike Little <little@CASTER.SSW.UPENN.EDU>
Sender:       "SAS(r) Discussion" <SAS-L@UGA.CC.UGA.EDU>
From:         Mike Little <little@CASTER.SSW.UPENN.EDU>
Organization: University of Pennsylvania
Subject:      Re: Extracting var length and format

Michael Little (little@psci.sas.upenn.edu) wrote:
: Hi,
 
:   Is there any method similar to the CALL LABEL() routine to find the
: length of a SAS variable (both char and numeric) and any date format
: that was permanently associated with numeric vars?  I suppose I can
: always grep from a Proc Contents (SAS 6.11 for AIX), but I'd like a more
: elegant way.  (Or is it just soooo simple and I don't see it?)
 
:  Thanks,
:   Mike
 
 Well, I'm answering my own question... but only because the lightbulb
came on after I suggested in another thread that someone look up
in the SAS-L archives Phil Mason's post under the subjet,
"Re: How to export SAS dataset to Excel ?" (from 1994).
 
 He uses an output dataset created in Proc Contents.  Oh.  I never did this
in any of my own programs.  It works!  Cool.  FORMAT and LENGTH are var names,
and there's one obs per variable.  The TYPE var is 1 for numeric, 2 for
character.  All the info I need!
 
 I wish I could answer all my questions by helping others to answer their
questions!
 
 Still: Why does SAS have a CALL LABEL routine but not other contents-related
routines?
 
 - Mike
 
 --
  Michael Little, Social Science Computing
  353 McNeil, phone: 215-573-3331, 215-898-6454
  little@ssc.upenn.edu