SAS allows the programmer to declare the scope of macro variables using %LOCAL or %GLOBAL, but the macros themselves are always created in the global scope.
Say you have a macro that in another language, say Python, would be considered a function. Within the macro you want a sub-macro (i.e., sub-function) to be used only within the outer macro.
%macro outer;
%put NOTE: outer;
/* This "sub-macro" is defined within the outer macro and is
intended only for use within the outer macro. */
%macro inner(foo);
%put NOTE: inner &foo;
%mend;
%inner(1);
%inner(2);
%mend;
%outer;
/* If the "sub-macro" has a local scope, the next step would fail */
%inner(3);
/* However, it succeeds */
This can lead to conflicts if the macro %inner is defined somewhere else in the same session. One way of dealing with this is to be careful to give the inner macro a unique name like __outer_inner where the underscores in the prefix suggest a local scope, and adding outer to the macro name indicates the macro is to be used only in the outer macro.
Another option is to use the %sysmacdelete to delete the inner macro:
%macro outer;
%put NOTE: outer;
%macro inner(foo);
%put NOTE: inner &foo;
%mend;
%inner(1);
%inner(2);
/* Delete the inner macro */
%SYSMACDELETE inner;
%mend;
%outer;
/* This fails because of SYSMACDELETE */
%inner(3);
Tested with SAS 9.4M3 on Windows 7.
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