SAS: Filling the missing values by block of data - sas

Question

Say that I have the following database:
Min Rank Qty
2 1 100
2 2 90
2 3 80
2 4 70
5 1 110
5 2 100
5 3 90
5 4 80
5 5 70
7 1 120
7 2 110
7 3 100
7 4 90
I need to have the database with the continuous values for minutes like this:
Min Rank Qty
2 1 100
2 2 90
2 3 80
2 4 70
3 1 100
3 2 90
3 3 80
3 4 70
4 1 100
4 2 90
4 3 80
4 4 70
5 1 110
5 2 100
5 3 90
5 4 80
5 5 70
6 1 110
6 2 100
6 3 90
6 4 80
6 5 70
7 1 120
7 2 110
7 3 100
7 4 90
How can I do this in SAS? I just need to replicate the previous minute. The number of observations per minute varies...it can be 4 or 5 or more.

Answer 1

It is not that hard to imagine code that would do this, the problem is that it quickly starts to look messy.
If your dataset is not too large, one approach you could consider the following approach:
/* We find all gaps. the output dataset is a mapping: the data of which minute (reference_minute) do we need to create each minute of data*/
data MINUTE_MAPPING (keep=current_minute reference_minute);
set YOUR_DATA;
by min;
retain last_minute 2; *set to the first minute you have;
if _N_ NE 1 and first.min then do;
/* Find gaps, map them to the last minute of data we have*/
if last_minute+1 < min then do;
do current_minute=last_minute+1 to min-1;
reference_minute=last_minute;
output;
end;
end;
/* For the available data, we map the minute to itself*/
reference_minute=min;
current_minute=min;
output;
*update;
last_minute=min;
end;
run;
/* Now we apply our mapping to the data */
*you must use proc sql because it is a many-to-many join, data step merge would give a different outcome;
proc sql;
create table RESULT as
select YD.current_minute as min, YD.rank, YD.qty
MINUTE_MAPPING as MM
join YOUR_DATA as YD
on (MM.reference_minute=YD.min)
;
quit;
The more performant approach would involve trickery with arrays.
But i find this approach a bit more appealing (disclaimer: at first thought), it is quicker to grasp (disclaimer again: imho) for someone else afterwards.
For good measure, the array approach:
data RESULT (keep=min rank qty);
set YOUR_DATA;
by min;
retain last_minute; *assume that first record really is first minute;
array last_data{5} _TEMPORARY_;
if _N_ NE 1 and first.min and last_minute+1 < min then do; *gap found;
do current_min=last_minute+1 to min-1;
*store data of current record;
curr_min=min;
curr_rank=rank;
curr_qty=qty;
*produce records from array with last available data;
do iter=1 to 5;
min = current_minute;
rank = iter;
qty = last_data{iter};
if qty NE . then output; *to prevent output of 5th element where there are only 4;
end;
*put back values of actual current record before proceeding;
min=curr_min;
rank=curr_rank;
qty=curr_qty;
end;
*update;
last_minute=min;
end;
*insert data for use on later missing minutes;
last_data{rank}=qty;
if last.min and rank<5 then last_data{5}=.;
output; *output actual current data point;
run;
Hope it helps.
Note, currently no access to a SAS client where i am. So untested code, might contain a couple of typo's.

Answer 2

Unless you have an absurd number of observations, I think transposing would make this easy.
I don't have access to sas at the moment so bear with me (I can test it out tomorrow if you can't get it working).
proc transpose data=data out=data_wide prefix=obs_;
by minute;
id rank;
var qty;
run;
*sort backwards so you can use lag() to fill in the next minute;
proc sort data=data_wide;
by descending minute;
run;
data data_wide; set data_wide;
nextminute = lag(minute);
run;
proc sort data=data_wide;
by minute;
run;
*output until you get to the next minute;
data data_wide; set data_wide;
*ensure that the last observation is output;
if nextminute = . then output;
do until (minute ge nextminute);
output;
minute+1;
end;
run;
*then you probably want to reverse the transpose;
proc transpose data=data_wide(drop=nextminute)
out=data_narrow(rename=(col1=qty));
by minute;
var _numeric_;
run;
*clean up the observation number;
data data_narrow(drop=_NAME_); set data_narrow;
rank = substr(_NAME_,5)*1;
run;
Again, I can't test this now, but it should work.
Someone else may have a clever solution that makes it so you don't have to reverse-sort/lag/forward-sort. I feel like I have dealt with this before but the obvious solution for me right now is to have it sorted backwards at whatever prior sort you do (you can do the transpose with a descending sort no problem) to save you an extra sort.