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Chris Hemedinger 0
Running Windows PowerShell Scripts

Windows PowerShell is one of my favorite tools to use for gathering information from my PC and network, and also for automating processes.  If you are familiar with UNIX shells (such as Korn shell or its variants), you will probably be very comfortable with Windows PowerShell.  Just like its UNIX

Rick Wicklin 0
Storing and loading modules

You can extend the capability of the SAS/IML language by writing modules. A module is a user-defined function. You can define a module by using the START and FINISH statements. Many people, including myself, define modules at the top of the SAS/IML program in which they are used. You can

Chris Hemedinger 0
Birthdays among friends

Earlier today, Rick posted interesting information about which time of year the most babies are born, at least in the USA. I don't have data nearly as extensive as what's available at the NCHS, but I do have a sample of birthday records to compare against Rick's findings.  My sample

Rick Wicklin 0
The most likely birthday in the US

Do you know someone who has a birthday in mid-September? Odds are that you do: the middle of September is when most US babies are born, according to data obtained from the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) Web site (see Table 1-16). There's an easy way to remember this

Sandy Varner 0
What's behind door #1? goats, cars or SAS Doc

For years mathematicians have been pondering the Monty Hall Problem – you know, the old TV show where you have 3 doors and behind one door is a car (or some nice prize) and behind the other two doors are goats (or some undesirable prize). You pick door #1.  But

Programming Tips
Rick Wicklin 0
Loops in SAS

Looping is essential to statistical programming. Whether you need to iterate over parameters in an algorithm or indices in an array, a loop is often one of the first programming constructs that a beginning programmer learns. Today is the first anniversary of this blog, which is named The DO Loop,

Advanced Analytics
Mike Gilliland 0
Guest Blogger: Udo Sglavo on Cross-validation using SAS Forecast Server (Part 2 of 2)

In Part 1, Udo provided SAS code to replicate the example in Hyndman's blog.  Below, he shows the results of out-of-sample testing, and draws some conclusions on the computational efficiency of this approach. Out-of-sample Testing In addition to the example shared by Hyndman, out-of-sample data was used to illustrate the final performance

Chris Hemedinger 0
The unlikely pedigree of sample data in SAS

We ship many sample data sets with SAS products. By using well-understood sample data sets, we can teach concepts or show off product features without distracting the audience/students with data collection or prep. At least, that's the way it's supposed to work. But occasionally the sample data can cause a

Rick Wicklin 0
Visualizing Scrabble games

My elderly mother enjoys playing Scrabble®. The only problem is that my father and most of my siblings won't play with her because she beats them all the time! Consequently, my mother is always excited when I visit because I'll play a few Scrabble games with her. During a recent

Learn SAS
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The wild, wild West of SAS Press

You’ve gotten to know Stacey Hamilton; now it’s time to learn more about SAS Press acquisitions editor John West! John  West typically works on programming and statistics titles and has been with SAS Publishing for 22 years: He started at SAS as a proofreader, then moved into technical editing where

Chris Hemedinger 0
A Google Fight is not a fair fight

At least, that's according to my colleague, Rick Wicklin.  In a recent blog post, Rick points out that estimating popularity based on results of Google searches is a bad idea. Well, that just disqualified my claim that PROC REPORT is more popular than PROC TABULATE, as measured via a GoogleFight.

Learn SAS
Shelly Goodin 0
SAS author's tip: useful PROC CORR options

 This week's SAS author's tip comes from a large green book that many of you are familiar with: A Step-by-Step Approach to Using SAS for Univariate & Multivariate Statistics, Second Edition by Norm O'Rourke, Larry Hatcher, and Edward J. Stepanski. Despite its massive size, this isn't an intimidating text. The authors ease you

Rick Wicklin 0
Visualizing correlations between variables in SAS

Exploring correlation between variables is an important part of exploratory data analysis. Before you start to model data, it is a good idea to visualize how variables related to one another. Zach Mayer, on his Modern Toolmaking blog, posted code that shows how to display and visualize correlations in R.

Advanced Analytics
Mike Gilliland 0
The New (BF) Deal

We had a tornado in April, an earthquake on Tuesday, a drought all summer, and a hurricane arrives on Saturday. All I can figure is that Cary, NC has way too many sinners per capita. What's next -- pestilence? The BFD Makeover The BFD (and all SAS blogs) will now be

Analytics
Robert Powell 0
Back to basics of state budgets

The recent budget debate between President Obama and Congress reminded me of many of the discussions I observed during my years as State Controller and Deputy State Budget Officer in North Carolina.  These discussions are related specifically to principles adhered to in budget development and budget deliberations by elected officials. 

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