SAS Processing Supported by the XML Engine

The XML engine supports input (read) and output (create) processing. The XML engine does not support update processing.

The XML engine is a sequential access engine in that it processes data one record after the other. The engine starts at the beginning of the file and continues in sequence to the end of the file. The XML engine does not provide random (direct) access, which is required for some SAS applications and features. For example, with the XML engine, you cannot use the SORT procedure or ORDER BY in the SQL procedure. If you request processing that requires random access, a message in the SAS log notifies you that the processing is not valid for sequential access. If this message occurs, put the XML data into a temporary SAS data set before you continue.