FOPEN

FOPEN

Opens an external file and returns a file identifier value

OS/390 specifics: files opened with FOPEN must be explicitly closed with FCLOSE

Syntax
Details
See Also

Syntax

FOPEN (fileref <,open-mode <,record-length <,record-format>>>)

fileref

specifies the fileref assigned to the external file.

open-mode

specifies the type of access to the file:

A	APPEND mode allows writing new records after the current end of the file.
I	INPUT mode allows reading only (default).
O	OUTPUT mode defaults to the OPEN mode specified in the host option in the FILENAME statement or function. If no host option is specified, it allows writing new records at the beginning of the file.
S	Sequential input mode is used for pipes and other sequential devices such as hardware ports.
U	UPDATE mode allows both reading and writing.

record-length

specifies the logical record length of the file. To use the existing record length for the file, specify a length of 0, or do not provide a value here.

record-format

specifies the record format of the file. To use the existing record format, do not specify a value here. Valid values are as follows:

B	data are to be interpreted as binary data.
D	use default record format.
E	use editable record format.
F	file contains fixed length records.
P	file contains printer carriage control in host-dependent record format. For data sets with FBA or VBA record format, specify `P' for the *record-format* argument.
V	file contains variable length records.

Details

Under OS/390, files that have been opened with FOPEN must be closed with FCLOSE at the end of a DATA step; files are not closed automatically after processing.

See FINFO for code examples.

See Also

FCLOSE
FOPTNAME
FOPTNUM
SAS Language Reference: Dictionary

Chapter Contents
Previous
Next
Top of Page