Connecting to non-SAS data storage

For much of SAS's early life, the SAS environment was very exclusive. Raw data brought into the environment largely comprised *.txt and *.csv files loaded to a SAS server from static media. The idea of connecting dynamically to another database housing data – in SAS or any other format – would have been a dream.

This dream became reality when SAS built in its open database connectivity (ODBC) connection capability. Using the ODBC, a programmer could run SAS, open an ODBC connection to another database in another environment, and query as well as extract data from this other environment into the SAS environment. The component that allows this capability is called SAS/ACCESS and can be added to Base SAS and SAS STAT when purchasing SAS. However, because this feature is not available in SAS University Edition, the examples we provide here will not be presented in runnable code.

Those of you who are familiar with SQL will recognize...