A00-215 Sample Questions Answers

The type and length of SnackType are character and 7, which makes option B correct. In the provided program, SnackType is assigned a value of "Chips" which is a character string. The length statement is used to explicitly declare SnackType as a character variable with a length of 7 before it is used, which will take precedence over any later assignments or implications about the variable's type or length.

References:

• SAS documentation on variable length.

When defining custom formats in SAS, it's important to adhere to the correct syntax, which includes ending format names with a period. In the submitted program, the format $convert is defined without a period at the end of the format name in the VALUE statement. This is likely causing an error since format names in the VALUE statement should always end with a period. Option C correctly identifies that adding a period to the end of the format name on the VALUE statement will allow SAS to properly recognize and apply the custom format to the Answer variable when the PROC PRINT step is executed.

The program provided in the question seems to have formatting errors, but based on the information provided, the suggested change is to add a period to make it $convert. which would correctly apply the format.

The other options would not resolve the issue of applying the custom format:

• A. Changing the case of the unformatted values will not help if the format is not correctly specified.
• B. The comma does not seem to be the issue based on the context given.
• D. The dollar sign is correct and necessary for character formats; removing it would cause the format to be invalid for character data.

References:

• SAS 9.4 documentation for the FORMAT procedure: SAS Help Center: PROC FORMAT

The correct syntax for generating the mean and standard deviation for specified variables using PROC MEANS is shown in option A. The PROC MEANS statement specifies the dataset to analyze (data=class) and includes the options (mean std) directly in the PROC statement. The VAR statement then lists the variables for which the statistics should be calculated (Height and Weight). The other options listed in B, C, and D are not correct syntax for PROC MEANS.

In the provided program, there are six distinct SAS statements:

• data FemaleStudents; - Data step beginning
• set sashelp.Class; - Set statement
• where Sex="F"; - Where statement
• Classroom="Red Room"; - Assignment statement
• run; - Run statement to execute the data step
• title "Female Students in Red Room"; - Title statement

Note that the proc print and the second run; statement are part of another PROC step to print the results and hence are not counted in this particular count. The final title; statement is used to clear the title setting and does not count as part of the program statements being asked about.

References:

• SAS 9.4 Language Reference: Concepts, "DATA Step"
• SAS documentation on "TITLE Statement"

The PROC CONTENTS step in SAS is used to display metadata about a SAS dataset, including information such as the names of variables, types of variables (numeric or character), lengths of variables, and other attributes like formats, labels, and indexes. Therefore, the correct answer is:

• A) a report showing the descriptor portion of the REVENUE data set

The descriptor portion of a SAS data set contains metadata about the dataset's structure, not the actual data values or any specific information about individual variables beyond their structure and definition in the dataset. Options B, C, and D suggest details that are not part of the dataset's descriptor information as shown by PROC CONTENTS.

References: SAS 9.4 Procedures Guide: Statistical Procedures.

In SAS, datasets can be either temporary or permanent, depending on the library where they are stored. Temporary datasets are stored in the Work library and are deleted at the end of the session, while permanent datasets reside in user-defined libraries or in libraries that refer to a more persistent storage location.

For this question:

• B. Mylib.new: This is a permanent dataset. The prefix 'Mylib' suggests it is stored in a user-defined library (not the temporary 'Work' library), implying that the data persists beyond the current session unless explicitly deleted or if the library's link to the storage location is removed.
• D. Temp.new: Despite the potentially misleading name 'Temp', if this dataset is not explicitly stored in the Work library, it could indeed be permanent. The permanence of a dataset is determined by its library reference, not by its name. If 'Temp' is a user-defined library linked to a persistent storage, then 'Temp.new' is also permanent.

C. Work.new: This dataset is explicitly temporary as it is stored in the Work library, which is cleared at the end of the SAS session.

A. New: Without additional context about the library, 'New' does not provide enough information to determine its permanence. It could be either temporary or permanent depending on the library it references.

References:SAS documentation on libraries and dataset management, SAS Institute.

The correct answer is A: Ods excel='c:\report.xlsx' style=analysis;. This syntax is correct for the ODS EXCEL statement in SAS, where you specify the path and filename, followed by the 'style' option to apply a specific style template to the output Excel file. The 'style=analysis' is used to set the output appearance according to the 'ANALYSIS' style template provided by SAS. Option B is syntactically incorrect and does not use the 'style' option correctly. Option C incorrectly places a slash which is not syntactically valid in this context, and Option D misses the equals sign and quotes which are necessary for correct syntax in SAS.References:

• SAS documentation on ODS EXCEL statement: SAS Support: ODS EXCEL Statement

The PROC SORT statement that specifies the sort variable is: BY

The BY statement in PROC SORT is used to specify the variable(s) by which the data should be sorted.

The correct answer is C. To create the NODONATIONS dataset, which includes only the employees who did not make any donations, a merge operation is used with a conditional statement to filter out those records. The syntax if inE=1 and inD=0; ensures that the merged dataset includes only the observations from the EMPLOYEES dataset that do not have a corresponding observation in the DONATIONS dataset. This is achieved using data step processing with the in= option to create temporary variables that indicate whether the data is coming from the input dataset.

In the other options:

• A is incorrect because inE=0 and inD=0 will never be true after a merge since at least one of the datasets must contribute to the merged observation.
• B lacks the necessary conditional logic to filter out employees with donations.
• D is incorrect because if inE=1 and inD=1; would actually select employees who made donations, the opposite of what we want.

References:

• SAS documentation on merging data sets using the DATA step.

In SAS, the FORMAT procedure (PROC FORMAT) allows users to create custom formats that can be used to change the way data is displayed without altering the data itself. The VALUE statement within PROC FORMAT is a key component of this procedure.

The VALUE statement can indeed create both numeric and character formats, which is why option C is correct. Numeric format names typically do not start with a $ sign (this is reserved for character format names), and the keyword UNKNOWN is not a part of the VALUE statement syntax; it is used in a different context within PROC FORMAT, specifically for handling undefined data values when using custom formats.

Moreover, the LIB= option is not used within the VALUE statement. The LIB= option is used at the PROC FORMAT level to specify the library where the formats should be stored or from which they should be read.

References

• SAS 9.4 documentation for the PROC FORMAT and VALUE statement.
• "SAS Formats and Informats." in "Step-by-Step Programming with Base SAS 9.4" from the SAS Institute.

To subset data in SAS using the data step, the where statement is used to specify the conditions that observations must meet to be included in the new data set. The correct syntax for subsetting the SASHELP.BASEBALL data set to include only players in the 'East' Division with 75 or more hits is as follows:

data bball;

set sashelp.baseball;

where Division = 'East' and nHits >= 75;

run;

This code, as shown in option D, uses the where statement with the correct logical operator and to ensure that both conditions must be true for a record to be included in the new dataset. Options A, B, and C either use incorrect syntax or logical operations that do not match the required conditions for the subset. Option A has an incorrect combination of conditions, B uses two where statements which is not valid syntax, and C incorrectly uses the or operator which would include players not in the 'East' Division or with fewer than 75 hits.

In a DATA step concatenation in SAS, when multiple datasets are listed in a SET statement, SAS concatenates the datasets vertically, stacking them one on top of the other. The length of variables in the resulting dataset is determined by the first dataset that appears in the SET statement. If the same variable appears in multiple datasets, SAS uses the length as it is first encountered. It does not require columns with the same name to be renamed; rather, it stacks them directly. There is no maximum number of tables that can be listed in a SET statement for concatenation; more than two can be concatenated. Lastly, concatenation combines data vertically, not horizontally as option D suggests.

References

• SAS 9.4 Language Reference: Concepts, "Concatenating Data Sets."

The correct syntax for a conditional if-then block in SAS that includes a do group for executing multiple statements is:

if condition then do;

statement1;

statement2;

end;

In Option B, the syntax if age<13 then do; opens a do group, and age_Cat='Pre-teen'; and account='No Social Media'; are the two statements inside the do group, followed by an end; statement to close the group. However, there is a typo with the use of dashes instead of equal signs for assignment in the variable statements which seems to be an error, so technically, none of the provided options has the correct syntax without an error. The correct syntax should use equal signs (=) for assignment within the do group:

if age<13 then do;

age_Cat='Pre-teen';

account='No Social Media Allowed';

end;

References:

• SAS documentation on conditional processing with IF-THEN/ELSE statements, SAS Institute.

In SAS, the DATA step is a powerful tool that allows programmers to perform a variety of tasks such as reporting, managing, and analyzing data. The DATA step processes data one observation at a time, making it highly efficient for data manipulation tasks. It enables the creation of new datasets, modification of existing ones, and complex data transformations. Additionally, within a DATA step, you can use a wide range of programming statements and functions to calculate new variables, merge or sort datasets, and perform conditional processing. The flexibility and functionality provided by DATA steps make them a fundamental part of SAS programming for handling and preparing data for further analysis or reporting.References: SAS 9.4 Language Reference: Concepts.

To rename a variable when reading a dataset in SAS, you use the rename= option inside the parentheses following the dataset's name in the set statement. The correct syntax for renaming the variable 'Name' to 'StudentName' is: rename=(oldname=newname). Therefore, the correct option is A, which correctly places the old variable name 'Name' first, followed by an equal sign, and then the new variable name 'StudentName'. The parentheses enclose the rename operation, and it is correctly nested within the set statement.

References:

• SAS documentation on the RENAME= data set option, SAS Institute.

The SAS program provided includes a PROC FORMAT step that defines a numeric format called Syn and applies this format to the variable answer in the PROC PRINT step. The format maps the value '0' to 'No', '1' to 'Yes', and all other values to 'Unknown'.

However, there is a syntax error in the PROC FORMAT step: it uses a dollar sign before Syn, which is used to indicate character formats, but the format is defined for numeric values (0 and 1). Therefore, when applying this format to the answer variable in PROC PRINT, it should not have a dollar sign, it should be format answer Syn.; instead of format answer $yn.;.

The correct output based on the given code, assuming the error with the dollar sign is corrected, would be as follows:

• For numeric values 0 and 1, 'No' and 'Yes' would be displayed, respectively.
• For any other numeric value, 'Unknown' would be displayed.
• For character values, the format would not apply and the actual values would be displayed.

Given that the values in the 'answer' column are numeric, the program will format them according to the defined Syn format. Thus, the report corresponding to Option D, which shows numeric values unformatted, would be the one created. This indicates that the format was not applied because of the syntax error with the dollar sign.

References:

• SAS 9.4 documentation for the FORMAT procedure and statement: SAS Help Center: PROC FORMAT

The type of error that does not produce expected results and does not generate errors or warnings in the log is a logic error. Logic errors occur when there is a flaw in the program's logic, which causes it to operate incorrectly, but the syntax is correct so it does not produce any error or warning messages. Unlike syntax errors which are mistakes in the program's code that prevent it from compiling or running, logic errors are more insidious because the program still runs but yields incorrect results. For example, a programmer may accidentally code an incorrect formula or use a wrong variable name that still exists, so the program runs but produces incorrect output.

References:

• SAS documentation on error types.

The correct statement to import a CSV file into SAS and create a dataset is option B. The PROC IMPORT statement is used in SAS to read data from external files and create a SAS data set. Let's break down why option B is correct:

• datafile= specifies the location and filename of the external data file. In this case, "sales.csv" is the correct filename and format for a CSV file.
• dbms=csv tells SAS that the format of the external data file is CSV (comma-separated values).
• out=mydata.sales; specifies the name of the output SAS dataset. It consists of two parts: the libref mydata and the dataset name sales. This tells SAS to store the new dataset in a library called mydata with the dataset name sales.

Option A uses an incorrect syntax as it incorrectly specifies the data= option, which is not valid in this context. Also, the out= option is incorrectly quoted and terminated with a semicolon within the quotes.

Option C has a typo in the out= option (out=mydata.gales;), which incorrectly specifies the output dataset name. Additionally, it incorrectly specifies the data= option, which should actually be datafile=.

Option D has incorrectly quoted the out= option and uses a hyphen instead of an equals sign. Additionally, it does not use quotes around the filename, which may cause issues if the filename contains special characters or spaces.

References:SAS 9.4 documentation, specifically the PROC IMPORT statement: SAS Help Center: PROC IMPORT Statement

The correct answer is C. The DATA step and PROC PRINT steps ran without errors. In the SAS log shown, there is a clear error in the PROC SORT step because of the use of an incorrect option by ascending Increase which caused the "Variable ASCENDING not found" error. However, the DATA step completed successfully, as indicated by the "NOTE" that follows it, confirming that 56 observations were read from the SASHELP.SHOES data set where Region is Africa. Additionally, the PROC PRINT step also completed successfully, indicated by the "NOTE" at the bottom of the log which confirms that 56 observations were read from the WORK.AFRICA data set, implying the PROC PRINT step executed without issue.

A is incorrect because the error in PROC SORT did not cause the program to stop; SAS continued processing the next steps. B is incorrect because the PROC SORT step did not run successfully. D is incorrect because the PROC PRINT step did not fail; it ran successfully.

References:

• SAS documentation on error messages.
• Understanding the SAS log and error messages.

The correct answer is D. This option uses the PROC PRINT procedure, which is used to print SAS data sets. The format statement within PROC PRINT temporarily assigns a format to a variable for the duration of the PROC PRINT step. Here is how it works:

• data=sashelp.shoes; tells SAS which dataset to print.
• Format sales comma12.; temporarily assigns a comma format to the sales variable, making it easier to read, especially if the numbers are large. The comma12. format adds commas for thousands, millions, etc., and displays the number in a field that is 12 characters wide.
• The format is only applied for the duration of the PROC PRINT step and does not permanently change the dataset.

The other options are incorrect for the following reasons:

• Option A attempts to use a PROC FORMAT step, which is for creating custom formats, not for assigning formats to variables in a dataset.
• Option B uses a DATA step which could permanently assign the format to the sales variable if it were syntactically correct (it should be set sashelp.shoes; instead of Set sashelp,sheoes;).
• Option C mentions PROC CONTENTS which displays metadata about variables in a dataset and does not have the capability to assign formats.

References:

• SAS 9.4 documentation for the PROC PRINT statement: SAS Help Center: PROC PRINT