How to Enable Autosave (SAS)

SAS has a tendency to crash when querying from large data sets. To help mitigate this dilemma, I would recommend always saving program code prior to execution. Another useful feature that can be enabled, is the SAS Autosave. This feature is a standard SAS feature that can be toggled through the SAS Enhanced Editor. From my experience with Windows 10 and SAS 9.4, the SAS Autosave feature is not enabled by default.

To enable the SAS Autosave feature, choose “Tools” from the menu bar of the SAS Enhanced Editor. After “Tools” has been selected, select “Options”, and then select “Preferences”.

You should be presented with this screen:

From the menu, choose “Edit”. After selecting “Edit”, choose the box next to “Autosave Every”, and then select the duration that must pass prior to autosaving.

The file from which autosave files can be retrieved from is:

C:\Documents and Settings\<USERNAME>\Application Data\SAS\EnhancedEditor
This file must be monitored regularly, as it will eventually become filled with autosave files. I would recommend placing a shortcut to the file pathway on the desktop.