Re: MS Access and SAS datasets

Thanks for the input. Unfortunately, the datasets are quite wide. One
of them, for example, has over 1000 variables (columns). Had I been
involved with the creation of the initial SAS datasets, I would have
suggested a slightly different approach. Since this wasn't the case,
I'm stuck working with things the way they are. To complicate things,
ACCESS won't handle tables that wide so I'm having to mess with he data
anyway. Your (and Howard's) suggestions will at least get me going on
the right path. (Maybe I'll just round up some "slave" labor, AKA a
graduate student, to set up all the lookup tables in ACCESS.)

Thanks again

David Neal

Choate, Paul@DDS wrote:
> Hi David -
>
> I agree with Howard that CNTLOUT will give you your formats to develop
> lookup tables in Access. Alternately if your data isn't large and you
> don't care about normal form, you could process your variables through your
> formats with put statements and create parallel formatted data.
>
> In v9 there's VLABEL, VLABELX, and VARLABEL, etc. You can use VLABEL and
> array all your _numeric_ and then _character_ columns and create a label
> dataset.
>
> There's also the data dictionary which you can query and use the into:
> command to load a macro, or just dump the labels in a dataset.
>
> Personally, I like to use "options VALIDVARNAME=ANY;" and rename my
> variables as their labels before I port data to external databases, but I'm
> an analyst, not a programmer, and I can hear several mavens groaning in the
> distance as I write this. ;-)
>
> Good luck and hth -
>
> Paul Choate
> DDS Data Extraction
> (916) 654-2160
>
>
> On Mon, 23 May 2005 14:01:18 -0800, David Neal <afdbn@UAA.ALASKA.EDU> wrote:
>
>
>>I'm trying to move several SAS datasets to a single MS Access database.
>>When I use proc copy to move the data, I get the following note:
>>
>>
>>
>>NOTE: Copying SCFSAS.PT_MISC to SCFFAS.PT_MISC (memtype=DATA).
>>
>>NOTE: SAS variable labels, formats, and lengths are not written to DBMS
>>tables.
>>
>>
>>
>>My problem is that I'm interested in keeping the variable labels and the
>>formats as well. Is it possible for SAS to automatically create
>
> the "lookup
>
>>tables" from the formats? Also, is there a way to keep the variable labels
>>when I move from SAS to Access?
>>
>>
>>
>>David Neal