BUFSIZE= Table Option

Specifies the size of a permanent buffer page for an output SAS data set.

Category:	Table Control
Restriction:	Use with output data sets only.
Data source:	SAS data set

Syntax

Arguments

Details

Syntax

BUFSIZE= n | nK | nM | nG | hexX | MIN | MAX

Arguments

n | nK | nM | nG

specifies the page size in multiples of 1 (bytes); 1,024 (kilobytes); 1,048,576 (megabytes); or 1,073,741,824 (gigabytes). For example, a value of 8 specifies a page size of 8 bytes, and a value of 4k specifies a page size of 4096 bytes.

Requirement

K, M, and G must be uppercased.

hexX

specifies the page size as a hexadecimal value. You must specify the value beginning with a number (0–9), followed by an X. For example, the value 2dx sets the page size to 45 bytes.

Requirement

X must be uppercased.

MIN

sets the minimum number of buffers to 0, which causes SAS to use the minimum optimal value for the operating environment.

MAX

sets the page size to the maximum possible number in your operating environment, up to the largest four-byte, signed integer. The largest four-byte, signed integer is 2³¹–1, or approximately 2 billion bytes.

Details

The page size is the amount of data that can be transferred for a single I/O operation to one buffer. The page size is a permanent attribute of the data set and is used when the data set is processed.

A larger page size can speed up execution time by reducing the number of times SAS has to read from or write to the storage medium. However, the improvement in execution time comes at the cost of increased memory consumption.

To change the page size, copy the data set and either specify a new page or use the SAS default. To reset the page size to the default value in your operating environment, specify BUFSIZE=0.

Operating Environment Information: The default value for the BUFSIZE= table option is determined by your operating environment and is set to optimize sequential access. To improve performance for direct (random) access, you should change the value for BUFSIZE=.