[R] Reading sas7bdat files directly

[Frank E Harrell Jr]

David Winsemius wrote:
> 
> On Feb 4, 2010, at 5:31 PM, Alex Bryant wrote:
> 
>> Hi,   I have a need to process (in real-time) a large number of 
>> .sas7bdat files from within R.  The problem is I don't want to convert 
>> these files to .xpt (transport) every time.  So just checking if 
>> anyone has a (viable) way to read .sas7bdat files directly into R?
> 
> I believe (on the basis of what is written on the NCHS/NHANESwebsite) 
> that if you are a Windows user, which I am only under duress, you can 
> get at such data with a free product that SAS makes available:
> 
> http://www.sas.com/apps/demosdownloads/sassysview_PROD_8.2_sysdep.jsp?packageID=000176 
> 
> 
> Whether that product can be called as a system()  executable with 
> arguments, I have no idea.
> 

The SAS viewer has a pretty pathetic data export feature that won't even 
  produce valid csv files if you have any unmatched quotes in character 
variables.  I don't think it's very good about exporting metadata either.

Frank

-- 
Frank E Harrell Jr   Professor and Chairman        School of Medicine
                      Department of Biostatistics   Vanderbilt University