How to Cancel SAS Data management

To fully cancel and terminate a SAS session, especially when dealing with issues like an unresponsive session after using an ABORT CANCEL statement, follow these steps:

Terminating the SAS Session

If your SAS session becomes unresponsive after using an ABORT CANCEL statement, you may need to take the following actions to terminate the session properly:

• Interrupt the Current Process:

  • If the SAS session is busy and not responding, you might see a dialog box stating that SAS is busy. In this case, select the option to interrupt the current process. This will free the cursor but may not allow subsequent SAS statements to be processed due to the session being in an infinite loop.

• Terminate the SAS System:

  • To completely terminate the SAS session, you must select the "Terminate the SAS System" option twice.
  • When prompted with the question "Do you wish to wait for SAS to terminate normally?", answer "No".

Avoiding Data Set Replacement Issues

If you interrupted a DATA step and canceled the submitted statements, ensure that you handle existing data sets correctly to avoid replacing them with partial data sets:

• Use the NOREPLACE Option:

  • To prevent the replacement of a permanent data set, specify the NOREPLACE option in your DATA statement. For example:
    sas
    data mydata (noreplace);
    set sashelp.class;
    run;

  • Note that there is no circumvention for temporary data sets.

General Best Practices

• Avoid Using ABORT CANCEL with Subsequent Statements:

  • Be cautious when using the ABORT CANCEL statement followed by other SAS statements, as this can cause the SAS session to stop responding. Here is an example of code that might cause issues:
    sas
    data null;
    put ‘NOTE: Cancel was used to prevent a submit all.’;
    abort cancel nolist;
    run;

    data work.class;
    set sashelp.class;
    run;

    dm ‘output’;

  • This combination can lead to an unresponsive SAS session.

By following these instructions, you can ensure a clean termination of your SAS session and avoid common issues related to data set management and session responsiveness.