Viewing Data in SAS

Once we have the data in SAS we would like to view it to make sure everything is alright. To do this we use PROC PRINT. If you haven't done so, go ahead and import the sample data into the SAS as described here.

Now type the following in the Editor window and press F3. Note how we name the data file in the library.datasetname format.

PROC PRINT DATA = tutorial.lecture1;
RUN;

Results window will show the data. Note that most of the time your data has hundreds, if not thousands, of rows and it is not practical to see the whole data. In that case it is beneficial to limit the number of rows printed. To do this we can use the OBS=numberofrows argument in PROC PRINT statement. Following command will only print the first 10 rows in your data.

PROC PRINT DATA = tutorial.lecture1 (OBS=10);
RUN;
Tips and Tricks

We will use a new dataset to demonstrate PROC PRINT. You can download the data set from here. Copy the dataset to tutorial library you created in first lecture. Here is what this data looks like:

Country Emp_ID Order_Date Ship_Date Sale_Type Quantity Price Cost
Antarctica 1E+08 1/1/2012 1/7/2012 Internet 2 92.6 20.7
Puerto Rico 1E+08 1/1/2012 1/5/2012 Catalog 14 51.2 12.1
Virgin Islands (US) 1E+08 1/1/2012 1/4/2012 In Store 25 31.1 15.65
Aruba 1E+08 1/1/2012 1/4/2012 Catalog 30 123.7 59
Bahamas 1E+08 1/1/2012 1/4/2012 Catalog 8 113.4 28.45
Bermuda 1E+08 1/1/2012 1/4/2012 Catalog 7 41 9.25
Belize 120458 1/2/2012 1/2/2012 In Store 2 146.4 36.7
British Virgin Islands 1E+08 1/2/2012 1/5/2012 Catalog 11 40.2 20.2
Canada 1E+08 1/2/2012 1/5/2012 Catalog 100 11.8 5
Cayman Islands 120454 1/2/2012 1/2/2012 In Store 20 71 32.3
Costa Rica 1E+08 1/2/2012 1/6/2012 Internet 31 53 26.6
Cuba 121044 1/2/2012 1/2/2012 Internet 12 42.4 19.35
Dominican Republic 121040 1/2/2012 1/2/2012 Internet 13 48 23.95
El Salvador 1E+08 1/2/2012 1/6/2012 Catalog 21 266.4 66.7
Guatemala 120931 1/2/2012 1/2/2012 In Store 13 144.4 65.7
Haiti 121059 1/2/2012 1/2/2012 Internet 5 47.9 23.45
Honduras 120455 1/2/2012 1/2/2012 Internet 20 66.4 30.25
Jamaica 1E+08 1/2/2012 1/4/2012 In Store 23 169.8 38.7
Mexico 120127 1/2/2012 1/2/2012 In Store 30 211.8 33.65
Montserrat 120127 1/2/2012 1/2/2012 In Store 19 184.2 36.9
Nicaragua 120932 1/2/2012 1/2/2012 Internet 16 122 28.75
Panama 1E+08 1/2/2012 1/6/2012 Internet 20 88.2 38.4
Saint Kitts/Nevis 1E+08 1/2/2012 1/6/2012 Internet 20 41.4 18
St. Helena 120360 1/2/2012 1/2/2012 Internet 19 94.7 47.45
St. Pierre/Miquelon 120842 1/2/2012 ####### Internet 16 103.8 47.25
Turks/Caicos Islands 120372 1/2/2012 1/2/2012 Internet 10 57.7 28.95
United States 120372 1/2/2012 1/2/2012 Internet 20 88.2 38.4

To display this dataset we use PROC PRINT (don't forget to press F3 to run this code):

PROC PRINT DATA = tutorial.lecture2;
RUN;

This is how PROC PRINT displays the data:

Printing only certain columns

To print only certain variables we use the VAR statement:

If you don't want to see observation number printed:

Styling header

Headers can be styled with STYLE keyword within PROC IMPORT statement:

Adding SUMs

PRINT also allows some basic summary functionality of datasets such as SUM. For example, following code calculates the total for price:

PROC PRINT DATA = tutorial.lecture2;
SUM price; RUN;

We can also calculate subtotals, for example for sale_type, but doing this requires sorting the data beforehand with PROC SORT:

PROC SORT DATA = tutorial.lecture2;
BY sale_type;
RUN;

PROC PRINT DATA = tutorial.lecture2;
SUM price;
BY sale_type;
RUN;