Perform a 'bulk-renaming' of the variables of a given table.

%var_rename(idsn, var=, ex_var=, odsn=, suff=_new, ilib=WORK, olib=WORK);

idsn : input reference dataset, whose variables shall be renamed;
var : (option) list of variables that should be renamed; this parameter is incompatible with the parameter ex_var below; default: var is empty, and all variables present in the input dataset idsn will be renamed (unless ex_var is not empty);
ex_var : (option) list of variables that should not be renamed; this parameter is incompatible with the parameter var below;typically the identifying variables which will be used to perform the matching shall not be renamed; default: ex_var is empty;
suff : (option) generic suffix to be added to the names of the variables; default: suff=_new, i.e. a variable a in idsn will be renamed as a_new;
ilib : (option) name of the input library; by default: empty, i.e. WORK is used.

odsn : (option) name of the output dataset (stored in the olib library), that will contain the exact same data than idsn, where all variables defined by var and/or excluding those defined by ex_var are renamed as a concatenation of their former name and suff; default: odsn=idsn and the input dataset idsn is updated instead;
olib : (option) name of the output library; by default: empty, and the value of ilib is used.

Let us consider test dataset #5 in WORKing directory:

f	e	d	c	b	a
.	1	2	3	.	5

then both calls to the macro below:

%var_rename(_dstest5, var=a c d, odsn=out1, suff=2);

%var_rename(_dstest5, ex_var=b e f, odsn=out2, suff=2);

will return the exact same dataset out1=out2 (in WORKing directory) below:

f	e	d2	c2	b	a2
.	1	2	3	.	5

Run macro %_example_var_rename for more examples.

When merging two similar tables, it may be useful to be able to add a suffix over the names of the variables in order to avoid unexpected deletion of data. One may, for instance, need to merge two similar tables from different years: it is then necessary to rename all variables containing information that varies across time. The macro var_rename can be used for this purpose.
When none of the input parameters var and ex_var is passed, all variables present in the input dataset idsn are renamed.