The NOUNIQUEKEY option (aliases: NOUNIKEY | NOUNIKEYS | NOUNIQUEKEYS) for the SAS SORT procedure is not being honored when the host sort interface is used. In this scenario, the data is sorted, but it contains both the unique key observations and the non-unique key observations.

The circumvention is to set the SAS system option SORTPGM=SAS prior to the PROC SORT step that uses the NOUNIQUEKEY option. SORTPGM=SAS can be set in an OPTIONS statement prior to the PROC SORT step.

Here is an example:

 OPTIONS SORTPGM=SAS;  /* About to sort with NOUNIQUEKEY so use SAS internal sort */
 PROC SORT DATA=insasds OUT=outsasds NOUNIQUEKEY; 
   BY var1 ... varx;
 RUN;
 OPTIONS SORTPGM=BEST; /* Finished with NOUNIQUEKEY option so reset to default */

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Operating System and Release Information

A fix for this issue for Base SAS 9.4_M3 is available at:

A fix for this issue for Base SAS 9.4_M2 is available at: