Date:         Thu, 29 Jan 2004 10:41:12 -0500
Reply-To:     "F. J. Kelley" <jkelley@UGA.EDU>
Sender:       "SAS(r) Discussion" <SAS-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
From:         "F. J. Kelley" <jkelley@UGA.EDU>
Subject:      Re: leading blanks trimmed
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii

Read the data with the $CHARw. informat.  That will preserve
the leading blanks.  When writing, the $w. format will
preserve leading blanks, but when reading it does not.



---- Original message ----
>Date: Thu, 29 Jan 2004 06:57:56 -0800
>From: Kea <kea2003@AEMAIL4U.COM>
>Subject: leading blanks trimmed
>To: SAS-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>
>Dear All,
>
>I read in ("input") a data set, made minor calculations to
it, and
>wrote back out ("put").
>I used the following commands to read in and write out:
>
>@0001   var1    $200.
>@0201   var2    $200.
>...
>...
>
>However I have noticed that the data written out had the
preceding
>blanks trimmed. According to the SAS online Docs this should
not
>happen unless I use a LEFT alignment function.
>
>How can I make sure that SAS does not modify the original
data in any
>way while reading and writing???
>
>Many thanks in advance,
>Kea