Data Step Processing [7-9]

Descriptor Portion of Data Set

The descriptor portion of the data set is also created at the end of the compilation phase.

It contains information about the data set such as the number of observations, the size of the data set, the list of variables and so forth.

It can be printed using the CONTENTS procedure.

​Example

Proc Contents Data=Profile;
Run;

Below is the screenshot of the descriptor portion of the PROFILE data set.

The CONTENTS procedure will be explained in detail in later modules.

The compilation phase ends when the descriptor portion of the data set is established.

In summary, SAS does two things in this phase:

1. It checks the syntax error of the code.
2. It creates the input buffer, PDV and the descriptor portion of the data set if no syntax error is found.

During the compilation phase, no data will be read or written to the data set.