In my article about finding an initial guess for root-finding algorithms, I stated that Newton's root-finding method "might not converge or might converge to a root that is far away from the root that you wanted to find." A reader wanted more information about that statement. I have previously shown
If you use a GPS system or a mapping app on your phone, you're familiar with geospatial intelligence. But did you know this same technology can be used to map the spread of diseases, to understand the spread of wildfires, to visualize environmental issues - and much more? The proliferation
The SAS Global Certification program is proud to announce the release of a new credential: SAS Certified Visual Business Analyst Using SAS Visual Analytics. This credential is designed for analysts who are using SAS Visual Analytics to explore data and create insightful data visualizations. With SAS Visual Analytics now deployed in over
Big data. Streaming data. Complex data. We’ve all heard the reasons why organizations feel like they’re facing an insurmountable data challenge. Now, it’s time to do something about it. For the past few years, SAS has helped some of the world’s leading companies make sense of an avalanche of data.
Discovery Channel's Shark Week starts July 5, 2015 - and I've created a special SAS map & graph of shark attacks in North Carolina to get you in the mood for their week of shark education! But first, to get you in the mood for my blog, here's a picture
.@philsimon on the new challenges of data governance.
A SAS programmer asked an interesting question on a SAS Support Community. The programmer had a nonlinear function with 12 parameters. He also had file that contained 4,000 lines, where each line contained values for the 12 parameters. In other words, the file specified 4,000 different functions. The programmer wanted
One of my earlier blogs on handling percent (%) values in SAS was very popular (it's been viewed over 34,000 times!), so I thought I'd write a similar blog on handling time (mm:ss.ss) values in SAS ... This past weekend I was in a dragonboat race (that's me in the
Love them or hate them, value-added models (VAMs) have changed the way we look at education today. VAMs have reshaped our thinking about the effectiveness of programs, schools, educators and colleges that prepare them. While VAMs have been used in the social sciences for decades, we can credit a few
As a proud father of three young children, Father’s Day is very special to me. I pulled together some data about the holiday for a fun blog post, but with three kids it’s difficult to find time to write. Evenings end with me and my wife collapsed on the couch
Jim Harris says event stream processing determines if big data is eventful and relevant enough to process and store.
Have you ever waited a bit for SAS Enterprise Guide to display the Output Data tab when submitting a SAS program that generates multiple output tables? Or, perhaps your program only generates one big output table but it takes a little while for it to surface on the Output Data
One of the fundamental principles of computer programming is to break a task into smaller subtasks and to modularize the program by encapsulating each subtask into its own function. I have written many blog posts over the years about how to define and use functions in the SAS/IML language. I
SAS/IIF Grant to Promote Research on Forecasting For the thirteenth year, the International Institute of Forecasters, in collaboration with SAS, is proud to announce financial support for research on how to improve forecasting methods and business forecasting practice. The award for the 2015-2016 year will be (2) $5,000 grants. The
Recently, I had an opportunity to participate in an analyst briefing around the Internet of Things (IoT). During the review, a chart was shown to summarize the status of IoT projects in the manufacturing sector. I wasn’t surprised by the varying degree of “completeness” of IoT projects across this industry, but
The metaphors we choose to describe our data are important, for they can either open up the potential for understanding and insight, or they can limit our ability to effectively extract all the value our data may hold. Consisting as it does of nothing but electric potentials, or variations in
Who is your best customer? The answer to this question can vary dramatically depending on your industry. A retailer’s best customer is someone who comes back to their store over and over again. A gym owner’s best customer could be considered consumer who pays their monthly on time but never
People are such an important aspect of data analytics. I was reminded of this at the recent Strata+Hadoop World event, where I saw first hand that the UK is indeed facing the same skills gaps as elsewhere in the world. Perhaps that didn’t surprise me, but I also noticed the
What cities have the most and least profitable public transportation services in the US? Perhaps you can find out in this graphical visualization of the data! The US data I'm analyzing here covers things like buses, vans, and rail ... but it might be even more interesting to analyze data from
Determining the life cycle of event stream data requires us to first understand our business and how fast it changes. If event data is analyzed, it makes sense that the results of that analysis would feed another process. For example, a customer relationship management (CRM) system or campaign management system like
My previous blog posts here for marketing have centred on data-driven marketing themes and how marketers can exploit data and analytics to create a more customer-centric, fact-based culture. And by extension, how this, combined with quality execution is likely to lead to better customer experiences and improved customer equity. This
A feature of SAS/IML 13.2 (shipped with SAS 9.4m2, Aug 2014) is the ability to execute SAS/IML statements that are in a file. The feature is implemented by the new EXECUTEFILE subroutine. This feature is similar to the CALL EXECUTE statement. The difference is that the EXECUTEFILE subroutine reads, parses,
I remember when I first started in public child welfare 21 years ago and the word "outcomes" was introduced. At that time, we believed that if it felt good and children and families seemed happy that we were doing a good job - those were our outcomes. We were wrong.
Did you know that the education industry is heavily embracing data visualization to run their business? Just like any other industry, leaders in education need to understand their customers (i.e. students). They need to understand how the students are doing, how they're progressing and if intervention is needed to ensure
How do we hire data scientists at SAS, since we are not unique in our search for a rare talent type that continues to be in high demand? This post is the last in a series on finding data scientists, based on best practices at SAS and illustrated with some
Still think business intelligence (BI) and analytics are only for big companies? The truth is, small to medium size enterprises (SMEs) can benefit from BI and analytics in a big way. Digital disruption Thanks to innovative new developments SME’s (and small teams who haven't yet gotten IT’s attention) can now
As consumers, the quality of our day is all too often governed by the outcome of computed events. My recent online shopping experience was a great example of how computed events can transpire to make (or break) a relaxing event. We had ordered grocery delivery with a new service provider. Our existing provider
A recent study by Bai & Anderson has found that some hospitals charge 10x (ie, 1000%) higher than the standard rates set by Medicare. Many news agencies have posted the list of the 50 US hospitals that have the highest markup. But I am more visually oriented, so of course I used SAS
If you have not yet discovered the new Ask the Expert series on the SAS Training site, you are missing out on a treasure. Visit the site right now and review all of the available topics, from "Newbie" to Analytics to Visualization to good ol' SAS programming. Go on; I'll
"Daddy, help! Help me! Come quick!" I heard my daughter's screams from the upstairs bathroom and bounded up the stairs two at a time. Was she hurt? Bleeding? Was the toilet overflowing? When I arrived in the doorway, she pointed at the wall and at the floor. The wall was
