Under Windows, SAS treats tab characters in code differently in batch programs than it does in the interactive SAS editors, as follows:

• When a SAS program containing tab characters ('09'x, in hexadecimal notation) is submitted in batch, the tab characters are processed as is within code (for example, in CARDS or DATALINES statement blocks), and they can be used as input delimiters.
• When tab characters are present in code that is opened in the SAS Program Editor, the tab characters are replaced by blanks in the editor window and when the code is submitted.
• When tab characters are present in code that is opened in the SAS Enhanced Editor, the tab characters are preserved in the editor. However, they are replaced by blanks when the code is submitted. This happens regardless of what options are set in the Enhanced Editor.

When SAS code is submitted interactively and tab characters are replaced with blanks, the results can be unpredictable, including the generation of error messages or notes similar to the following:

NOTE: Invalid data for {variable} in line {n} {cols}.

NOTE: SAS went to a new line when INPUT statement reached past the end of a line.

To avoid this issue, you either need to run your code in batch mode or change your code so that the tab character is not a syntactic requirement.

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