What's New

What's New in SAS 9.2 National Language Support (NLS) Reference Guide


Overview

In this release, SAS has expanded the scope and capabilities of National Language Support (NLS). NLS is a set of features that enable a software product to function properly in every global market for which the product is targeted. SAS contains NLS features to ensure that you can write SAS applications that conform to local language conventions. Typically, software that is written in the English language works well for users who use the English language and data that is formatted using the conventions that are observed in the United States. However, without NLS, these products might not work as well for users in other regions of the world. NLS in SAS enables users in regions such as Asia and Europe to process data successfully in their native languages and environments.

This topic describes the changes and enhancements that have been made to the NLS documentation and features.


Documentation Enhancements


Internationalization Compatibility for SAS String Functions

The Internationalization Compatibility for SAS String Functions section specifies the level of internationalization compatibility for SAS string functions.


National Collating Sequences of Alphanumeric Characters

The National Collating Sequences of Alphanumeric Characters table has been updated to reflect current collating sequences.


Language Switching

The Language Switching section describes how you can view SAS messages in another language using a Unicode server.


Locales

The following locales have been added in SAS 9.2 NLS. Information on how locales work in SAS programming is provided in Overview of Locale Concepts for NLS:


Encodings

In the third maintenance release for SAS 9.2, the SBCS, DBCS, and Unicode Encoding Values Used to Transcode Data table was updated to reflect current values.

In the third maintenance release for SAS 9.2, the following encodings were removed from the Double-Byte Encodings for UNIX table:

The following encodings have been added in SAS 9.2 NLS. Information on how encodings work in SAS programming is provided in Overview of Encoding for NLS:


Autocall Macros

The following SAS 9.2 NLS autocall macros are new:


Macro Functions

The following SAS 9.2 NLS macro functions are new:


Formats


Informats


Functions


System Options

In the third maintenance release for SAS 9.2, the NLSCOMPATMODE option has been modified. A note has been added to the Details section notifying the user that a warning will be generated when NLSCOMPATMODE is set.

The following system options are new for SAS 9.2 NLS:

BOMFILE

specifies whether to write the Byte Order Mark (BOM) prefix on Unicode-encoded external files

LOCALELANGCHG

determines whether the language of the text of the ODS output can be changed

RSASIOTRANSERROR

displays a transcoding error when illegal data is read from a remote application