Understanding Access to SAS/SHARE Data Sources

To access remote data sources, the SAS ODBC Driver uses a SAS/SHARE server. For complete information about SAS/SHARE, see SAS/SHARE User's Guide. It is not necessary for the server to be running when you define your data sources. However, the server must be running on your remote host in order for you to access your data sources.
Because a SAS/SHARE server is used by multiple users, it is usually invoked on the remote host at system start-up time. Therefore, users usually do not need to locally invoke the server.
The SAS/SHARE administrator must complete these steps:
  1. Define a service name and network port in the TCP/IP services file for the SAS/SHARE server. (For more information, see TCP/IP Services File.)
  2. Create a SAS program that uses the SERVER Procedure. See the following example:
    options comamid=tcp;
    proc server id=servername authenticate=optional;
    run;
    Invoke this SAS program to run in the background using host-specific command syntax. For more information, see Communications Access Methods for SAS/CONNECT and SAS/SHARE.