Chapter Contents

DESCRIBE

DESCRIBE

Displays the attributes of a variable

Abbreviation: DES

Syntax
Details
Examples
See Also

Syntax

DESCRIBE arg-list | _ALL_

contains one or more arguments specified in the form <entry-name\ >variable:

entry-name\: is the name of a catalog entry that contains an SCL program. If the entry resides in the current catalog, then entry-name can be a one-level name. If the entry resides in a different catalog, then entry-name must be a four-level name, and the entry must already be loaded into the application's execution stack. A backslash must follow the entry name.
variable: identifies an SCL variable to describe. The program that uses the specified variable must already be loaded in the application's execution stack.

describes all variables in all programs that are in the application's execution stack.

The DESCRIBE command displays the attributes of the specified variables. You can also use dot notation to specify object attributes. The attributes reported are

contains the name of the variable whose attributes are displayed.

contains the variable's length. All numeric variables have a length of 8 bytes. Variables of type list return the number of items in the list.

contains the variable's class or category:

SYSTEM: designates a system variable.
WINDOW: designates a window variable.
NONWINDOW: designates a nonwindow variable.

contains the data type of the variable:

ARRAY ELMT: array element
CHAR: character
CHAR ARRAY: character array
LIST: list
LIST ARRAY: list array
NUM: numeric
NUM ARRAY: numeric array
OBJECT: object
OBJECT ARRAY: object array

Display the name, data type, length and class of variable A:
```
DEBUG> des a
```
A is described as
```
des age
AGE         NUM    8  NONWINDOW
```
Display the name, data type, length, and class of all elements in the array ARR:
```
DEBUG> des arr
```
Display the attributes of array element ARR[i+j]:
```
DEBUG> des arr[i+j]
```
Display the attributes of variable A in the entry TEST1.SCL:
```
DEBUG> des test1\a
```
Display the attributes of all elements of array BRR in the entry TEST2.SCL:
```
DEBUG> des test2.scl\brr
```
Display the attributes of object1:
```
DEBUG> des object1
```
Display the attributes of the visible attribute on object1:
```
DEBUG> des object1.visible
```
Display the attributes of the attribute name on object1 in the entry TEST2.SCL:
```
DEBUG> des test2\object1.name
```

See Also

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Copyright © 1999 by SAS Institute Inc., Cary, NC, USA. All rights reserved.