Erik Engstrom wrote: > > I would like to thank Arlin Collins, Tom Abernathy, Bob Duell, Andrew > Smith and Karl Schimanko for thier responses to my post. I did not know > about the informats for binary data. I found out that there is a 24 > bite header at the beginning of each data file. My program works fine > as long as I cut the header out with a binary editor before running. > How do I tell SAS to skip the first 24 bites of the data file? > I included my program below just in case those of you who helped me were > interested in what I ended up with. As you can see it turns out that > the file structure was very different than I was origionally told. > > data trafdat.detect; > infile 'c:\trafdat\tstfile.dat' recfm=f lrecl=9454; > array vol(3150) vol1-vol3150; > array occ(3150) occ1-occ3150; > array err(3150) err1-err3150; > array flag(3150) flag1-flag3150; > array stat(3150) stat1-stat3150; > input (time) (pib4.) @; > do i=1 to 3150; > input (vol(i) occ(i) err(i)) (pib1.) @; > stat(i)=int(err(i)/16); > flag(i)=mod(err(i),16); > end; > time=time+315597600; > format time datetime16.; > drop err1-err3150 i; > > run; > > Like I said it runs fine, I just need it to skip the first 24 bites of > the data file. > > Thanks in advance, > > Erik Engstrom > Research Analyst > Minnesota Department of Transportation > eman@minn.net

Erik,

To skip the first 24 bytes (characters) on each record you can use the input statement before your DO loop to move the pointer 24 spaces:

INPUT +24 @; * Skip 24 bytes and hold the line for the next INPUT; do i=1 to 3150; ... end;

-- Ron Coleman Links Analytical, Inc. Linking your data to your business! 3545-1 St. Johns Bluff Rd. Suite 300 Jacksonville FL 32224 rcoleman@worldnet.att.net