Question

"Suppose you submit the DATA step below in a SAS windowing environment. If the active window displays the message DATA step running for a long time, what probably happened?

data ;
set ;
if age < 13 then group = 'Pre-teen';
else group = 'Teen';"
a) The program is executing normally.
b) An error occurred during execution.
c) The program is stuck in an infinite loop.
d) The program is waiting for user input.

Answer 1

If the active window displays the message 'DATA step running for a long time' in a SAS windowing environment, it suggests that the program is stuck in an infinite loop.

Step-by-step explanation:

If the active window displays the message 'DATA step running for a long time' in a SAS windowing environment, it suggests that the program is stuck in an infinite loop (option c). An infinite loop occurs when a loop or conditional statement does not have an exit condition or the condition is not being met, causing the program to repeat the same set of instructions indefinitely. In this case, the program may continuously evaluate the 'if' statement without any changes to the data, resulting in it running for an extended period of time.