SAS format dataset

Sometimes we prefer to display the analyzed data in a format that is different from what already exists in the dataset. F or example, we want to add a dollar sign and two decimal places to a variable with price information. O r we might want to display a text variable, all capital. W e can use FORM to apply the built-in SAS format, proC FORMAT is the user-defined format for the application. I n addition, a single format can be applied to multiple variables.

Grammar

The basic syntax for applying the built-in SAS format is:

format variable name format name

The following is a description of the parameters used:

• The variable name is the variable name used in the dataset.
• Format name is the data format to be applied to a variable.

Cases

Let's consider the following SAS dataset that contains employee details for your organization. W e want all names to be displayed in capitals. F ormat statements to achieve this.

DATA Employee; 
  INPUT empid name $ salary DEPT $ ; 
  format name $upcase9. ;
DATALINES; 
1 Rick 623.3	IT 		 
2 Dan 515.2 	OPS	
3 Mike 611.5 	IT 	
4 Ryan 729.1    HR 
5 Gary 843.25   FIN 
6 Tusar 578.6   IT 
7 Pranab 632.8  OPS
8 Rasmi 722.5   FIN 
;
RUN;
 PROC PRINT DATA=Employee; 
RUN; 

When executing the above code, we can get the following output.

Use PROC FORMAT

We can also use PROC FORMAT to format the data. I n the following example, we assign the new value to the variable DEPT of the department name.

DATA Employee; 
  INPUT empid name $ salary DEPT $ ; 

DATALINES; 
1 Rick 623.3 IT 		 
2 Dan 515.2 OPS
3 Mike 611.5 IT 	
4 Ryan 729.1 HR 
5 Gary 843.25 FIN 
6 Tusar 578.6 IT 
7 Pranab 632.8 OPS
8 Rasmi 722.5 FIN 
;
proc format;
value $DEP 'IT' = 'Information Technology'
      'OPS'= 'Operations' ;
RUN;
 PROC PRINT DATA=Employee; 
 format name $upcase9. DEPT $DEP.; 
RUN; 

When executing the above code, we can get the following output.