SLEEP Function

Suspends the execution of a program that invokes this function for a specified period of time

Category: Special

See: SLEEP Function in the documentation for your operating environment.

Syntax

SLEEP ( n <, unit >)

Arguments

is a numeric constant that specifies the number of units of time for which you want to suspend execution of a program.
Range: n ‰

unit

specifies the unit of time, as a power of 10, which is applied to n . For example, 1 corresponds to a second, and .001 to a millisecond.
Default: 1 in a Windows PC environment, .001 in other environments

Details

The SLEEP function suspends the execution of a program that invokes this function for a period of time that you specify. The program can be a DATA step, macro, IML, SCL, or anything that can invoke a function. The maximum sleep period for the SLEEP function is 46 days.

Examples

Example 1: Suspending Execution for a Specified Period of Time

The following example tells SAS to delay the execution of the DATA step PAYROLL for 20 seconds:

 data payroll;     time_slept=sleep(20,1);     ...  more SAS statements  ...  run;

Example 2: Suspending Execution Based on a Calculation of Sleep Time

The following example tells SAS to suspend the execution of the DATA step BUDGET until March 1, 2000, at 3:00 AM. SAS calculates the length of the suspension based on the target date and the date and time that the DATA step begins to execute.

 data budget;     sleeptime='01mar2000:03:00'dt-datetime();     time_calc=sleep(sleeptime,1);     ...  more SAS statements  ...;  run;