I just happened to be working on a script that has that exact same problem.
I used the approach the @Jeff_Perkinson referenced above
for (i=1, i<=nitems(fixlist), i++,
try(fixlist[i]<<Set Modeling Type( "Continuous" )); // Try() ignores errors, so if a column isnt there it still runs
try(fixlist[i]<<Set Data Type( numeric));
)
JMP Systems Engineer, Health and Life Sciences (Pharma)