Scripting Guide - SAS

Chapter 9 Data Tables 237
Data Table Basics
End Of Field (Tab|Space|Comma|Semicolon|Other|None)
EOFOther ("char")
End Of Line (CRLF|CR|LF|Semicolon|Other)
EOLOther ("char")
Strip Quotes|Strip Enclosing Quotes (Boolean)
Labels|Table Contains Column Headers (Boolean)
Year Rule|Two digit year rule ("10-90"| "19xx"| "20xx"| Custom)
Column Names Start|Column Names are on line (number)
Data Starts|Data starts on line (number)
Flags (number)
Custom Rule (name)
Lines to Read
Use Apostrophe as Quotation Mark
For example,
or:
open("c:\test.txt", End of Field(comma), Labels(0),
columns(studentName=character(12), age=numeric(14)));
open("c:\test2.txt", End of Field(Other), EOFOther ("|"), Labels(1),
columns(studentName=character(12), age=numeric(14)));
The options for Open:
Column names and lengths You can specify column names, types, and field widths with a Columns
argument. For example, columns(studentName=character(12), age=numeric(14)) in the
example above.
Note that if you specify settings for a column other than the first column in the file, you must also
specify settings for all the columns that precede it. For example, You want to open a text file that has
four columns, Name, Sex, Age, and ID, in that order, and you want to set Age to numeric(2). You
must also set Name and Sex, and you must list them in the same order:
columns(Name=character(15), Sex=character(1), Age=numeric(2))
You are not required to specify the settings for any columns that follow the one that you want to set.
Strip Quotes Boolean. Specifies whether to remove quotation marks from string values.
When saving spreadsheet-style data in text format, most programs, including JMP, enclose string values
inside double quotation marks ( " ). This ensures that when another program imports the text file, any
spaces, tabs, or commas that are meant to be part of a string value are not misinterpreted as field
delimiters. For example, a string value such as John Doe would be interpreted as two separate strings,
John and Doe, if space were the field delimiter. But "John Doe" inside quotation marks would be
interpreted as a single string, because when most programs including JMP read a quotation mark, they
disregard any delimiter characters and keep reading until they encounter the second quotation mark.
However, since you do not usually want those double quotation marks to be part of the value (for
example, you want John Doe, not "John Doe", in the data table), JMP provides an option Strip
Quotes. If you choose this option, JMP respects the quotation mark rules but removes the marks from
the values.