Overview of SAS/ACCESS Software for Relational Databases SAS Views of DBMS Data 5
On some DBMSs, you can use Pass-Through Facility statements with SAS/AF
applications to handle the transaction processing of the DBMS data. Using a
SAS/AF application gives a user complete control of COMMIT and ROLLBACK
transactions. Pass-Through Facility statements give you better access to DBMS
return codes.
The Pass-Through Facility accepts all the extensions to SQL that are provided by
your DBMS.
The following table contains a list of tasks and the features that you can use to
accomplish them.
Table 1.1 SAS/ACCESS Features for Common Tasks
Task SAS/ACCESS Features
LIBNAME statement*
Pass-Through Facility
Read DBMS
tables or views
View descriptors**
LIBNAME statement*
DBLOAD procedure
Create DBMS
objects, such as
tables
Pass-Through Facility’s EXECUTE statement
LIBNAME statement*
View descriptors**
Update, delete,
or insert rows
into DBMS
tables
Pass-Through Facility’s EXECUTE statement
DBLOAD procedure with APPEND option
LIBNAME statement and APPEND procedure*
Append data to
DBMS tables
Pass-Through Facility’s EXECUTE statement
LIBNAME statement and SAS Explorer window*
LIBNAME statement and DATASETS procedure*
LIBNAME statement and CONTENTS procedure*
List DBMS
tables
LIBNAME statement and SQL procedure dictionary tables*
LIBNAME statement and SQL procedure’s DROP TABLE statement*
LIBNAME statement and DATASETS procedure’s DELETE statement*
DBLOAD procedure with SQL DROP TABLE statement
Delete DBMS
tables or views
Pass-Through Facility’s EXECUTE statement
* LIBNAME statement refers to the SAS/ACCESS LIBNAME statement.
** View descriptors refer to view descriptors that are created in the ACCESS procedure.
SAS Views of DBMS Data
SAS/ACCESS enables you to create a SAS view of data that exists in a relational
database management system. A SAS data view defines a virtual data set that is
named and stored for later use. A view contains no data, but rather it describes data
that is stored elsewhere. There are three types of SAS data views:
