ACCESS Procedure

UPDATE Statement

Updates a SAS/ACCESS descriptor file

Interactions: applies to access or view descriptors
ASSIGN, RESET, SELECT, UNIQUE statements are not supported when you use the UPDATE statement.
Note: Rules that apply to the CREATE statement also apply to the UPDATE statement. For example, the SUBSET statement is valid only for updating view descriptors.
See: Statement Sequence for Accomplishing Tasks

Syntax

Required Arguments

libref.member-name

identifies the libref of the SAS library where you want to store the descriptor and identifies the descriptor name.

ACCESS

specifies an access descriptor.

VIEW

specifies a view descriptor.

Optional Argument

password-option

specifies a password.

Details

The UPDATE statement identifies an existing access descriptor or view descriptor that you want to update. UPDATE is normally used to update database connection information, such as user IDs and passwords. If your descriptor requires many changes, it might be easier to use the CREATE statement to overwrite the old descriptor with a new one.

Altering a DBMS table might invalidate descriptor files that are based on the DBMS table, or it might cause these files to be out of date. If you re-create a table, add a new column to a table, or delete an existing column from a table, use the UPDATE statement to modify your descriptors so that they use the new information.

Last updated: February 3, 2026