Local and Remote Data

When you open data in SAS Enterprise Guide, you must select whether you want to look for the data on your local computer, a SAS server, or in a SAS folder.

If you select a location on your local computer, you can browse the directory structure to find the data. You can open any type of data file that SAS Enterprise Guide can read.

If you click Servers, you can look for your data on a server. A server can either be a local server if SAS software is installed on your own computer, or it can be a remote server if SAS software is installed on a different computer. The servers that you see depend on the repository you are connected to.

Within each server there are icons that you can select for Libraries and Files. Libraries are shortcut names for directory locations that SAS knows about. Some libraries are defined by SAS, and some are defined by SAS Enterprise Guide. Libraries contain only SAS data sets.

The Files folder on a server enables you to access data files in the directory structure on the computer where the SAS server is running. For example, if you wanted to open a Microsoft Excel file on a server that is defined in your repository, you would use the Files node to locate and open the file.

You can also open files from servers by double-clicking the file in the Server List window. The Server List window is displayed by default in the Resources pane in the lower-left corner of the workspace. To open the Server List window if it is closed, select View Server List.

Open from SAS Servers window with Local server selected

Click to view the full window.

If you click SAS Folders, you can browse the list of SAS folders that you can access. SAS folders are defined in the SAS Metadata Server and can be used to provide a central location for your stored processes, information maps, and projects so that they can be shared with other SAS applications. SAS folders can also contain content that is not in the SAS Metadata Server, such as data files.

Next you open SAS data from your local computer.