What Does the LUA Procedure Do?

The Lua programming language is an embeddable scripting language that runs on any platform that has a standard C compiler. This includes all versions of UNIX, Windows, and mobile operating systems, including Android, iOS, and others. Lua uses simple syntax, runs fast computations, and automatically manages memory allocation.

The LUA procedure enables you to run statements from the Lua programming language within SAS code. You can submit Lua statements from an external Lua script, or enter Lua statements directly in SAS code.

PROC LUA enables you to perform these tasks:

• run Lua code within a SAS session
• call most SAS functions within Lua statements
• call PROC FCMP functions within Lua statements
• submit SAS code from Lua
• call CAS actions
  Note: Support for calling CAS actions was added in SAS 9.4M5.
• read VARCHAR data
  Note: Support for VARCHAR data was added in SAS Viya 3.3.