To use the GENDER, AGEGROUP, and $COL formats in a subsequent SAS session, you must assign the libref Library again.

libname library 'c:sasformatslib'; 

SAS searches for the formats GENDER, AGEGROUP, and $COL in two libraries, in this order:

SAS uses the first instance of a specified format that it finds.

Just as with SAS formats, you associate a user-defined format with a variable in a FORMAT statement.

data carsurvey;
		infile 'Z:sasusercars.dat';
		input Age Sex Income Color $;
		format Sex gender. Age agegroup. Color $col. Income DOLLAR8.;
run;

Remember, you can place the FORMAT statement in either a DATA step or a PROC step. By placing the FORMAT statement in a DATA step, you permanently associate a format with a variable. Note that you do not have to specify a width value when using a user-defined format.

When you submit the PRINT procedure, the output for carsurvey now shows descriptive labels instead of the values for Age, Sex, Income, and Color.

proc print data=carsurvey;
 run;

When associating a format with a variable, remember to do the following:

If you do not format all of a variable's values, then those that are not listed in the VALUE statement are printed as they appear in the SAS data set, as shown in observation 3 of the figure below.

libname library 'c:sasformatslib';
proc format lib=library;
		value gender 	
					1 = 'Male'
					2 = 'Female';
		value agegroup  
					13 -< 20  = 'Teen'
					20 -< 65  = 'Adult';
		value $col 		
					'W' = 'Moon White'
					'Y' = 'Sunburst Yellow'
					'G' = 'Rain Cloud Gray';
run; 
data carsurvey;
		infile 'Z:sasusercars.dat';
		input Age Sex Income Color $;
		format Sex gender. Age agegroup. Color $col. Income DOLLAR8.;
run;
proc print data=work.carsurvey;
run;

When you build a large catalog of permanent formats, it can be easy to forget the exact spelling of a specific format name or its range of values. Adding the keyword FMTLIB to the PROC FORMAT statement displays a list of all the formats in your catalog, along with descriptions of their values.

libname library 'c:sasformatslib'; 
proc format library=library fmtlib; 
run;

When you submit this PROC step, a description of each format in your permanent catalog is displayed as output.

In addition to the name, range, and label, the format description includes the following details: