SAS 9.4 Language Reference, 6th Edition

Names in the SAS Language

Definition of a SAS Name

A SAS name is a name token that represents one of the following SAS language

elements:

• variable

• data set

• format

• informat

• procedure

• option

• statement label

• libref or fileref

• catalog entry

• array

• macro or macro variable

• component object

There are two types of names in SAS:

• SAS language element names (system-supplied names)

• user-supplied names

The following sections will discuss user-supplied SAS names.

Rules for User-Supplied SAS Names

Rules for Most SAS Names

The following list contains the rules that you use when you create most SAS names:

Note: The rules are more flexible for SAS variable names, data set names, view names,

and item store names than for other language elements. See “Rules for SAS Variable

Names” on page 26 and “Rules for SAS Data Set Names, View Names, and Item

Store Names” on page 27.

• The length of a SAS name depends on which element it is assigned to. Many SAS

names can be 32 bytes long; others have a maximum length of 8 bytes. For a list of

SAS names and their maximum length, see Table 3.1 on page 25.

• The first character must be an English letter (A, B, C, . . ., Z) or underscore (_).

Subsequent characters can be letters, numeric digits (0, 1, . . ., 9), or underscores.

• You can use uppercase or lowercase letters.

• Blanks cannot appear in SAS names.

• Special characters, except for the underscore, are not allowed. In filerefs only, you

can use the dollar sign ($), the number sign (#), and the at sign (@).

• SAS reserves a few names for automatic variables and variable lists, SAS data sets,

and librefs.

• When creating variables, do not use the names of special SAS automatic

variables (for example, _N_ and _ERROR_) or special variable list names (for

example, _CHARACTER_, _NUMERIC_, and _ALL_).

• When associating a libref with a SAS library, do not use these libref names:

• Sashelp

24 Chapter 3 • Rules for Words and Names in the SAS Language

• Sasmsg

• Sasuser

• Work

• When you create SAS data sets, do not use these names:

• _NULL_

• _DATA_

• _LAST_

• When assigning a fileref to an external file, do not use the filename SASCAT.

• When you create a macro variable, do not use names that begin with SYS.

Table 3.1 Maximum Length in Bytes of User-Supplied SAS Names

User-Supplied SAS Name Maximum Length in Bytes

Arrays 32

CALL routines 16

Catalog entries 32

Component objects 32

DATA step statement labels 32

DATA step variable labels 256

DATA step variables 32

DATA step windows 32

Engines 8

Filerefs 8

Formats, character 31

Formats, numeric 32

Functions 16

Generation data sets 28

Informats, character 30

Informats, numeric 31

Librefs 8

Macro variables 32

Names in the SAS Language 25