Using PROC CONTENTS to Identify Which SAS Base Engine was Used to Create a SAS File

You can use the CONTENTS procedure on all operating environments that use SAS 6 and later to find which Base SAS engine was used to create a SAS file.

Note  

Because z/OS operating environments do not use filename extensions, you must use PROC CONTENTS to identify the SAS base engine that was used to create SAS files under these operating environments.

Here is an example of using PROC CONTENTS on a data set in the z/OS environment:

 proc contents data=test.records; run; 

Here is an excerpt of the output:

 The SAS System     The CONTENTS Procedure Data Set Name: TEST.RECORDS Member Type:   DATA Engine:        V9 

The output shows that the data set RECORDS is a member of type DATA, and that it was created with the V9 engine.

You can also use PROC CONTENTS to find out whether a data set's operating environment format is foreign or native to the accessing operating environment. For more information, see "Identifying the Format of a SAS File" on page 15.