Data Sources and File Types Supported by the SAS Providers

The following table describes the different data sources and file types that are supported by the SAS providers.

Supported Data

File Type/Data Source and Description	Local Provider	IOM Provider	OLAP Provider	SAS/SHARE Provider	Base SAS Provider
SAS data files Contain both the data and the descriptor information. SAS data files have a member type of DATA.	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
SAS data views A virtual data set that points to data from other sources. SAS data views have a member type of VIEW.	No	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
Temporary SAS data sets A data set that exists only for the duration of the current program or interactive SAS session. Temporary SAS data sets are not available for future SAS sessions.	No	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
SAS index An auxiliary file that is a summary of a SAS data set. Indexes are never accessed directly, but they can provide faster access to specific observations during SQL evaluation, particularly when your data set is large.	No	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
SAS audit and backup files Auxiliary files that are used to audit the changes made to a data file.	No	No (Changes to the base data set are logged.)	No	No (Changes to the base data set are logged.)	No (Changes to the base data set are logged.)
Interface files Files created by other programs, such as ORACLE, DB2, or Sybase. SAS uses special engines to read and write the data.	No	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
Generation data sets Historical copies of a SAS data set.	Yes, when using `libbname.memname #gennum` in a direct open.	Yes, when using `libname.memname #gennum` in a direct open. (Not valid in SQL statements.)	No	Yes, when using `libname.memname #gennum` in a direct open. (Not valid in SQL statements.)	Yes, when using `libname.memname #gennum` in a direct open. (Not valid in SQL statements.)
SAS OLAP cubes A logical set of data that is organized and structured in a hierarchical, multidimensional arrangement.	No	No	Yes	No	No

Note: For more information about SAS file types, see SAS Language Reference: Concepts and the SAS Procedures Guide.

For rectangular data sources, if you can launch SAS and access a file, then that file can be accessed by the SAS/SHARE and IOM providers with the proper server configuration.

In addition, if the file is a SAS data set created on one of the supported platforms and you can access the file from Windows Explorer, then that file can be accessed by the local provider. The platforms must be compatible with your PC platform in the following ways:

They must use the same character set as the PC: ASCII.
They must not require floating point conversion. PC floating point numbers are IEEE.

Note: When working with data sets that were created in a different environment, the local provider translates numeric values but not character values.

The following operating environments meet the local provider's cross-platform requirements and are supported:

Solaris
HP-UX
RS 6000 AIX
MIPS ABI
Intel ABI
Windows
OS/2
AlphaVMS

The following operating environments do not meet the local provider's cross-platform requirements and are not supported:

ALPHA_OSF
CMS (ebcdic)
MVS (ebcdic)
VAX_VMS (dfloat)