I need do a full outer join on 2 sets of data that do not contain any common columns. Does anyone know how to do this?

Here is some more information:

I have a hold file that contains year and month going back 2 years.
I have a hold file that contains complaint descriptions.
I need to end up with a file that contains a complaint description for each month and year record. (the equivalent of doing a full out join in SQL)

I see in other focal point threads that I can do a match to achieve a full outer join, but that only appears to work if I actually have at least one common column between the 2 hold files. I'd like to know if it is possible to join 2 sets of data in this way. Thanks.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Scott Matson,

Try this: Use DEFINE to add a one-character blank column to each dataset. Then Join on the two blank columns as a one-to-many relationship. It's easiest if the blank columns are already part of your hold files. Otherwise you will need to use a DEFINE-based join.

Scott,

Do you mean that you want to join ALL the complaints to each month-year?
If so, make the smallest HOLD a FORMAT FOCUS with a blank field as an INDEX, then JOIN a blank field in the other to the focus file.

How about MATCH FILE?

Bingo! I created a blank field for each hold file I was trying to join together and then joined on that field. Now I have a complaint description for each month-year. Thanks!