BL_ACCOUNTNAME= LIBNAME Statement Option

Specifies the name of the account to use on the external storage system.

Valid in: SAS/ACCESS LIBNAME statement
Categories: Bulk Loading
Data Access
Default: none
Interaction: This option is used with the BL_DNSSUFFIX=,BL_FILESYSTEM=, and BL_FOLDER= options to specify the external data location.
Data source: Microsoft SQL Server, Snowflake, Spark
Notes: Support for Microsoft SQL Server was added in SAS 9.4M7.
Support for Snowflake and Spark was added in SAS 9.4M9.
See: BL_ACCOUNTNAME= data set option, BL_DNSSUFFIX= LIBNAME option, BL_FILESYSTEM= LIBNAME option, BL_FOLDER= LIBNAME option

Table of Contents

Syntax

BL_ACCOUNTNAME="account-name"

Syntax Description

account-name

specifies the name of the account to use on the external storage system.

Details

The external data location is generated using this option and the BL_DNSSUFFIX=, BL_FILESYSTEM=, and BL_FOLDER= LIBNAME options. These values are combined to define the URL to an external storage location in an Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2 location:

https://<account-name>.<network-storage-host-name>/<file-system-name>/<file-path-folder>

These values might result in a URL similar to https://myaccount.dfs.core.windows.net/myfilesystem/myfolder.

Microsoft SQL Server: This option is used when Microsoft SQL Server loads data to Azure Synapse Analytics (SQL DW) with an Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2 storage account. For more information, see Bulk Loading to Azure Synapse Analytics.

Snowflake: This option is used to facilitate bulk loading or bulk unloading compressed Parquet files that are stored in an Azure ADLS location. For more information, see Bulk Loading and Bulk Unloading Data Files in Azure ADLS Locations.

Spark: This option is used when the Spark engine bulk loads or bulk unloads data in Databricks. For more information, see Bulk Loading and Bulk Unloading with the Spark Engine.

Last updated: February 3, 2026