Date:         Thu, 20 Aug 2009 09:53:35 -0400
Reply-To:     Suresh Ramanathan <ramanathansuresh@YAHOO.COM>
Sender:       "SAS(r) Discussion" <SAS-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
From:         Suresh Ramanathan <ramanathansuresh@YAHOO.COM>
Subject:      shortest distance algorithm

Hello SAS Users,

 I am looking for an efficient way to find the closest dealer location for
every customer in our db.
 We have a customer table (37 mil unique customers) and a dealer table
(5000 unique dealers).
 Customer table has the latitude & the longitude of the customer location
in decimal degrees and the
 Dealer table has the latitude & the longitude of the dealer location in
decimal degrees
 I was able to get the formula for calculating the distance between two
points based on lat & long from wiki.
 Is there a way other than using the brute force to get the shortest
dealer location for every customer.
 Please share your thoughts.

Thanks
Suresh