Problem Note 34252: PROC APPEND or the PROC DATASETS APPEND statement issues warning with formatted variables
The following warning will be issued when using either PROC APPEND or the APPEND statement with PROC DATASETS when formatted variables in the two data sets are not in matching logical order:
WARNING: Variable xxx has format xxx on the BASE data set and
format yyyy on the DATA data set.
The problem occurs because the format defined with the variables can be mistakenly attributed to another variable. The variables appear to have the same format if you look at PROC CONTENTS output generated for the two data sets.
To circumvent the problem, create the data sets with the variables in the same order.
Operating System and Release Information
| SAS System | Base SAS | z/OS | 9.2 TS1M0 | 9.2 TS2M0 |
| Microsoft® Windows® for 64-Bit Itanium-based Systems | 9.2 TS1M0 | 9.2 TS2M0 |
| Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Datacenter 64-bit Edition | 9.2 TS1M0 | 9.2 TS2M0 |
| Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Enterprise 64-bit Edition | 9.2 TS1M0 | 9.2 TS2M0 |
| Microsoft Windows XP 64-bit Edition | 9.2 TS1M0 | 9.2 TS2M0 |
| Microsoft® Windows® for x64 | 9.2 TS1M0 | 9.2 TS2M0 |
| Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Datacenter Edition | 9.2 TS1M0 | 9.2 TS2M0 |
| Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition | 9.2 TS1M0 | 9.2 TS2M0 |
| Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Standard Edition | 9.2 TS1M0 | 9.2 TS2M0 |
| Microsoft Windows XP Professional | 9.2 TS1M0 | 9.2 TS2M0 |
| Windows Vista | 9.2 TS1M0 | 9.2 TS2M0 |
| 64-bit Enabled AIX | 9.2 TS1M0 | 9.2 TS2M0 |
| 64-bit Enabled HP-UX | 9.2 TS1M0 | 9.2 TS2M0 |
| 64-bit Enabled Solaris | 9.2 TS1M0 | 9.2 TS2M0 |
| HP-UX IPF | 9.2 TS1M0 | 9.2 TS2M0 |
| Linux | 9.2 TS1M0 | 9.2 TS2M0 |
| Linux for x64 | 9.2 TS1M0 | 9.2 TS2M0 |
| OpenVMS on HP Integrity | 9.2 TS1M0 | 9.2 TS2M0 |
| Solaris for x64 | 9.2 TS1M0 | 9.2 TS2M0 |
*
For software releases that are not yet generally available, the Fixed
Release is the software release in which the problem is planned to be
fixed.
PROC APPEND or the APPEND statement in PROC DATASETS issues a warning when formatted variables are not in matching logical order.
| Type: | Problem Note |
| Priority: | medium |
| Date Modified: | 2009-02-19 15:18:04 |
| Date Created: | 2008-12-17 14:32:03 |
