In some cases, when you use the FILELOCKWAIT= option in the LIBNAME statement, the SAS^® System does not wait for the lock to be released on the SAS data set. When that happens, the following error appears in the SAS log:

libname timing "r:\path" filelockwait=10; 

proc sort data = timing.foo; 
   by fncl_ast_id; 
run; 

ERROR: A lock is not available for TIMING.FOO.DATA. 

The error might happen because a lock from a third-party application or from the file system is not checked by the FILELOCKWAIT= option. This behavior has been observed when the path to the library goes to a Microsoft Distributed File System (DFS).

Note: Using a non-NTFS file system that ignores locks on files that are held by various applications (for example, the Microsoft Distributed File System [DFS]) might cause problems with many SAS tasks.

Operating System and Release Information

A fix for this issue for Base SAS 9.21_M3 is available at: