Reading Dates and Times Using Informats (1)

Reading Date and Time Values

Reading Dates and Times Using Informats

You use SAS date and time informats to read date and time expressions and convert them to SAS date and time values. Like other SAS informats, date and time informats are composed of

an informat name
a field width
a period delimiter.

SAS informat names indicate the form of date expression that can be read using that particular informat. Here are some examples of common date and time informats:

DATEw.
DATETIMEw.
MMDDYYw.
TIMEw.

As you know, there are several ways to write a particular date. For example, all the following expressions represent the date October 15, 1999. Each of these common date expressions can be read using the appropriate SAS date informat.

Date Expression SAS Date Informat

10/15/99 MMDDYYw.

15Oct99 DATEw.

10-15-99 MMDDYYw.

99/10/15 YYMMDDw.

Date Expression	SAS Date Informat
10/15/99	MMDDYYw.
15Oct99	DATEw.
10-15-99	MMDDYYw.
99/10/15	YYMMDDw.

General form, INPUT statement with an informat:
INPUT <pointer-control> variable informat.;

where

pointer-control gives the absolute or relative position of the pointer.
variable is the name of the variable being read.
informat. is any valid SAS informat. Note that the format includes a final decimal point.

Reading Date and Time Values
Reading Dates and Times Using Informats