What's New

What's New in the SAS 9.2 Companion for z/OS

SAS for z/OS has the following new features and enhancements:

The default directory path where SAS is installed has changed to the following location:

SASROOT = /<customer specified UFS root>/<customer.mvs.prefix>/SASFoundation/9.2/
SASHOME = /<customer specified UFS root>/<customer.mvs.prefix>/
UFSROOT = /<customer specified UFS root>/

UFS refers to the UNIX file system.

SAS Software Enhancements

The SASRX REXX exec provides an alternative to the SAS CLIST for invoking SAS. SASRX supports the same command-line syntax as the SAS CLIST. SASRX also supports more options than the SAS CLIST, including mixed-case option values, options specified in a UNIX format, direct specification of SAS system options, and the use of UNIX System Services (USS) file and directory names as option values.
The Default Options Table and Restricted Options Table enable site administrators to specify SAS system options in a restricted options table for their entire site, a specific group of users, or an individual user.
The SAS Remote Browsing System has replaced the SAS Help Browser. The SAS Remote Browsing System enables you to view SAS documentation from a Web browser the same as the SAS Help Browser did in previous versions of SAS. Remote browsing is invoked when SAS displays HTML output, usually from the Output Delivery System (ODS), the Help system, or from the WBROWSE command. The process to set up the remote browser has been simplified, and the SAS Remote Browsing System also enables you to convert your item store help files to HTML help files.
SAS supports random access (byte-addressable) techniques to create and to read BSAM files.
SAS supports the next generation of Internet Protocol, IPv6, which is the successor to the current Internet Protocol, IPv4. Rather than replacing IPv4 with IPv6, SAS 9.2 supports both protocols. A primary reason for the new protocol is that the limited supply of 32-bit IPv4 address spaces was being depleted. IPv6 uses a 128-bit address scheme, which provides more IP addresses than did IPv4. For information about the DISABLESASIPV6= and TCPRSLV= options that control TCP/IP, see TKMVSENV File.
The format of a SAS configuration file has been enhanced with support for variable-length records. The configuration file also has been improved to support comments and to support the continuation of long option specifications across multiple lines.
SAS autocall macros can be stored in a UFS directory, a native z/OS PDS or a PDSE, or a combination of these locations. For more information about autocall libraries, see SASAUTOS= System Option.
When you access a UFS file by using aggregate syntax, such as fileref(member), where fileref is assigned to a UFS directory, without a file extension and without quotation marks around the member name, the file name is converted to lowercase and an appropriate file extension is appended. The previous implementation respected the file name case as it was entered and appended the appropriate extension. For more information about accessing a UFS file with aggregate syntax, see Accessing a Particular File in a UNIX System Services Directory.

Support for z/OS Extended Addressability Volumes

The second maintenance release for SAS 9.2 provides support for z/OS Extended Addressability Volumes (EAV). This support is new in z/OS V1R10, and it is expanded in z/OS V1R11. The following list contains details about the support that SAS offers for EAV.

SAS supports the VTOC ACCESS METHOD when this access method is used with EAV volumes.
SAS support for VSAM data sets has been expanded to include data sets that are allocated in Extended Addressability Space. This support includes external file support (FILENAME, FILE, and INFILE statements, and the FILENAME function), as well as support for SAS bound libraries in VSAM linear data sets.
zFS file systems are allocated within VSAM data sets and can be placed in Extended Addressability Space.
SAS support for Extended Format Sequential data sets has been expanded to include data sets that are allocated in the Extended Addressability Space. This feature is new in z/OS V1R11.

New cleanwork Utility

The cleanwork utility enables you to delete any leftover Work and Utility directories whose associated SAS process has ended.

New SAS Macro

The %ISHCONV macro enables you to convert item store help to HTML files that can be read by the Remote Browsing System.

New SAS Logging Facility

The SAS logging facility is a flexible, configurable framework for collecting, categorizing, and filtering events that are generated by SAS processes and writing events to a variety of output devices.

New FTP Function

SAS supports Using FTP with Universal Printing for sending universal printing output to a printer or to a file that is on another server, another machine, or another operating system.

New TKMVSENV Option

The third maintenance release for SAS 9.2 contains the new TKMVSENV option, TKOPT_ENV_UTILLOC. This option enables you to specify a UFS directory for temporary files.

Enhanced SAS Statements

The following SAS statements have been enhanced:

The FILE statement has two new options, BOM and BOMFILE. These options include a Byte Order Mark in a UNICODE-encoded file when the file is created.
FILENAME
- The BOM and BOMFILE options include a Byte Order Mark when a UNICODE-encoded file is created.
- The DSNTYPE option enables you to specify a sequential data set with a format of basic, large, or extended.
- The LOCKINTERNAL option enables you to set restrictions on how multiple users can simultaneously access a file.
- The LRECL option for UNIX file system (UFS) files and for spanned-format native MVS files has been increased to 16,777,215. LRECL can now be expressed in kilobytes or megabytes by specifying an integer followed with a k or m suffix.
- The NOMVSTRANS option has been restricted so that it is supported only for the Single-Byte Character Set (SBCS) version of SAS.
- The REUSE option enables you to reuse an existing file allocation for a new allocation.
- You can access files on other systems in your network by using the FTP, SFTP, and SOCKET access methods.
%INCLUDE
- The ENCODING option specifies the encoding to use when reading from the specified source. The value for ENCODING indicates that the specified source has a different encoding from the current session encoding.
- The S2V option specifies which column to use to begin scanning text from secondary source files that have a variable record format.
LIBNAME has a new option, DSNTYPE, that enables you to specify a sequential data set with a format of basic, large, or extended.

New SAS System Options

The following SAS system options are new:

The APPEND option enables you to append the specified value for the FMTSEARCH, HELPLOC, MAPS, MSG, SASAUTOS, SASHELP, or SASSCRIPT system options to the existing value of the specified option.
The DLDISPCHG option controls changes in the allocation disposition for an existing library data set.
The DLDSNTYPE option specifies whether the default value of the DSNTYPE LIBNAME option is BASIC, LARGE, or NONE.
The DLHFSDIRCREATE option creates a UFS directory for a SAS library that is specified with LIBNAME if the library does not exist.
The DLSEQDSNTYPE option specifies the default value of the DSNTYPE LIBNAME option for sequential-format disk files.
The ECHO option specifies a message that is to be echoed to the SAS log while you are initializing SAS.
The FILELBI option controls the use of the z/OS Large Block Interface support for BSAM and QSAM files, as well as files on tapes that have standard labels.
The FILESEQDSNTYPE option specifies the default value that is assigned to the DSNTYPE FILENAME option when it is not specified with a filename statement, a DD statement, or a TSO ALLOC command.
The FILESYNC option specifies when the operating system is to write the buffers that contain modified contents of permanent SAS files to disk.
The INSERT option enables you to insert the specified value for the FMTSEARCH, HELPLOC, MAPS, MSG, SASAUTOS, SASHELP, or SASSCRIPT options at the beginning of the value that is already specified for the system option.
The LRECL option specifies the default logical record length to use for reading and writing external files.
The PRIMARYPROVIDERDOMAIN system option specifies the domain name of the primary authentication provider.
The V6GUIMODE option specifies that SAS uses the Version 6 style for all of the SCL selection list windows.

Enhanced SAS System Options

The following SAS system options have been enhanced:

The BLKSIZE(device-type) option has a default value of HALF, instead of 6144. HALF corresponds to the largest efficient block size that is supported by SAS and standard access methods.
The CONFIG option can be specified on a command line or in a configuration file.
The FILELOCKS option has four new values: AUTO, SHARED, <path>, and <setting>. The AUTO and SHARED values perform the same as the equivalent values of the LOCKINTERNAL option of the FILENAME statement. The <path> and <setting> values specify a UFS directory and operating system locking value for the directory.
In the third maintenance release for SAS 9.2, the SASAUTOS system option supports the concatenation of autocall libraries that have different encodings.
The SORTWKNO option can specify the allocation of 0-99 sort work data sets.
The WORK option enables the specification of the SAS WORK library in a UFS directory.
The WORKTERM option specifies whether SAS erases WORK files at the termination of a SAS session. NOWORKTERM is still the default value for work libraries that reside in a bound library, but WORKTERM is the default value for libraries that reside in a UFS directory.

Deprecated SAS System Options

The following SAS system options have been deprecated:

HELPINDEX
HELPTOC
PRODTOC

Documentation Enhancements

The documentation for SAS on z/OS has traditionally used the terms UNIX System Services (USS) and hierarchical file system (HFS) to refer to the UNIX file system on z/OS. The SAS 9.2 documentation uses the terms UNIX file system and UFS to refer to this file system. The UNIX environment on z/OS and the UNIX file system are not the same thing. The documentation continues to use the terms UNIX System Services and USS to refer to the UNIX environment instead of the UNIX file system.

In addition to the original HFS implementation, the z/OS operating system also provides another UNIX file system known as the z/OS file system (zFS). zFS, which provides certain performance and manageability benefits, is functionally equivalent to HFS from the perspective of a SAS user.

Most occurrences of HFS, USS, and zFS have been changed to UFS. HFS is still used in feature names and in syntax statements and prefixes where it is the correct term. USS is still used where it refers to the UNIX environment on z/OS. The following list indicates the terminology changes:

UFS file system replaces HFS file system and USS file system.
UFS file replaces HFS file and USS file.
UFS library replaces HFS library and USS library.