STRINGDATES= LIBNAME Statement Option

Specifies whether to read date and time values from the database as character strings or as numeric date values.

Valid in: SAS/ACCESS LIBNAME statement, CONNECT statement
Category: Data Set Control
Alias: STRDATES= [Greenplum, HAWQ, Microsoft SQL Server, PostgreSQL, SAP IQ]
Default: NO
Data source: Amazon Redshift, Aster, DB2 under UNIX and PC Hosts, Google BigQuery, Greenplum, HAWQ, Impala, Microsoft SQL Server, Netezza, ODBC, OLE DB, PostgreSQL, SAP HANA, SAP IQ, Snowflake, Vertica, Yellowbrick
Note: Support for Yellowbrick was added in SAS 9.4M7.
Tip: Use STRINGDATES=NO for SAS 6 compatibility.

Table of Contents

Syntax

STRINGDATES=YES | NO

Syntax Description

YES

specifies that SAS reads date and time values as character strings.

NO

specifies that SAS reads date and time values as numeric date values.

Last updated: February 3, 2026