The Summer 2009 issue of Foresight is now available, and features a section on “Rethinking the Ways We Forecast.” Here is Editor Len Tashman’s preview: Are traditional forecasting tools suitable for predicting complex systems like the economy and the global climate? Basically, no, argue David Orrell and Patrick McSharry: such
If you use or have used SAS Web Report Studio, the SAS usability folks want to talk to you. Here is a call for participation: Dear Web Report Studio Users, In order to make SAS Web Report Studio (WRS) a better reporting tool, WRS will be conducting a few different
I just read about how Bill Gates has too many friends to keep up with on Facebook. Social networking is tough for social butterflies like Bill and myself. If only there was some sort of tool to help me sift through my friend data and help me categorize it.
Last weekend, I joined the merry band of muggles who descended on theaters across America to catch the opening weekend of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. Although not strictly by the book, the movie captured the teenage angst and special brand of magic that makes this particular novel
Getting a date prompt that filters on a range of dates requires an Information Map with a date variable that exists twice on the Information Map, two different prompts, and application of both within a Web Report Studio Report. Included are steps to get this to work. Within Information Map
I’m a self-described bookworm who’s been a little slow on the upstart with cutting-edge technology and the social media that’s intertwined with much of how we go about our daily routines. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I don’t like technology, I love it and I marvel at how
On a Monday July 20 segment of consumer advocate Clark Howard’s radio show, Clark discussed the common practice of hidden payments to influential bloggers. Apparently these high-tech shills pocket the payola, and then make favorable postings about particular products or services. According to Clark, there are new rules to prevent
Publishing is a rapidly changing business. As technology continues to revolutionize the way we consume information, one thing seems to remain constant – “content is king.” SAS Publishing recognizes that our customers now carry Kindles, visit online discussion forums for solutions, edit wikis with sample code and ask programming questions
Aren’t the internets wonderful? Just today I was trying to find the antonym of “naïve” and came across several terrific choices (sophisticated, worldly, well-informed, and intelligent) and one that didn’t make any sense (svelte???). However, upon further review at Merriam-Webster.com, I discovered that in addition to slender, lithe, and sleek
When you create SAS Enterprise Guide projects, what's your approach? Do you cram the process flow with thousands of nodes? Do you create different projects for each work task? Do you like one big SAS program? Or a bunch of little programs all linked together? That's the question that Michael
In April 2009, Google published a draft research paper “Predicting the Present with Google Trends,” by Google’s Chief Economist Hal Varian and Decision Support Engineering Analyst Hyungyoung Choi. The paper is available for download in an April 2 posting by Varian and Choy on the Google Research Blog that has
With apologies to Johnnie Cochran and Joyce Kilmer : “If the model do fit, it don’t prove ****” This was the warning from Trick #1. As a forecaster your job is to produce forecasts – as good as they can reasonably be expected to be – not to fit models
Instead of writing proc metalib statements, SAS has a custom task that you can download into Enterprise Guide. This interface provides non-SAS coders a quick mechanism to register new tables created on the server to the Metadata Library. http://support.sas.com/demosdownloads/setupcat.jsp?cat=SAS%20Enterprise%20Guide
Last year I posted a method to "mine" Twitter tweets for public sentiment after the vice-presidential debate. Patrick McLeod (University of Texas) recently posted an article showing how he adapted the method to analyze a category of tweets with the #iranelection tag. You can do fancier tricks with SAS and
The Spring 2009 Foresight feature on assessing forecastability is a must-read for anyone who gets yelled at for having lousy forecasts. (It should also be read by those who do the yelling, but you’d have to be living in Neverland to believe that will ever happen.) As I promised in
SAS programmers can often be (um...let's see...how best to put this...) set in their ways -- at least when it comes to their SAS work. This is due in part to the nature of SAS. The SAS program that you wrote 20 years ago in Version 5 probably still works
Today I welcome guest blogger Len Tashman, Editor of Foresight: The International Journal of Applied Forecasting. I’ve been a big fan of Foresight since its inception in 2005, and the Spring 2009 issue contains a special feature on a topic close to my heart -- assessing forecastability. Here is Len’s
The initial installation of a SAS Metadata Server allows for all undefined (in SAS User Manager) users to have access. It is recommended (after testing the entire install & before deploying to the business) that the security defined in the ‘Users & Permissions’ tab of the Default ACT is modified
AnnMaria's blog describing her acceptance of SAS Enterprise Guide, despite the shortcomings she's found, reminded me of this Irish Spring commercial. I'd like to take the time to craft a more thoughtful response to her post, but that will have to wait for a less-hectic day. In the meantime, I
SAS-sponsored podcasts, including a few from yours truly, are available on www.sas.com. Interested in hearing from a variety of SAS authors? There are dozens of interviews available on the SAS Press site. For example, listen to the authors of the "Little SAS Book" series, Susan and Lora, as they reveal
The content for this post comes from David Henderson, lead software developer for the SAS Web Parts for Microsoft Sharepoint. David talks about these and other ideas for SAS-Sharepoint integration in his SAS Global Forum paper. We are pleased to announce the availability of SAS Web Parts 1.1 for Microsoft
Tricks aren’t just for kids (or Louisiana senators or New York governors for that matter). Tricks are the lifeblood for many a forecasting software salesperson. Why admit that forecasting is difficult, that most things can’t be forecast as accurately as we would like, or that your software has the statistical
Here is the first of what I hope to be many guest postings from my colleagues here at SAS. Today Snurre Jensen, Business Advisor from SAS Denmark, writes about his recent encounter with a blog about dealing with demand changes in SAP APO. From Snurre: In my ongoing quest for
"…the sexy job in the next ten years will be statisticians…" That's a quote from Hal Varian, Google’s Chief Economist. It surfaced in an online interview months ago, but it's been getting a lot of play lately. Mr. Varian goes on to say: The ability to take data—to be able
If you are assigning special authorization for one SAS Object (Library, Folder, Server) to a specific User Group in SAS Management Console, using the Authorization Tab on that Object makes sense. However, if you have multiple SAS Objects to assign this special authorization to, it makes more sense to create
Just wanted to let everyone know of this new (but still experimental) functionality in SAS Management Console: An experimental SAS Management Console plug-in is available in 9.1.3 called BI Lineage. The following Sample document provides an overview of the tool, with screenshots on it's use: http://support.sas.com/kb/33/574.html This SAS Note provides
When accessing an external data source from Oracle, Teradata, SQL, etc with SAS it is widely accepted that the SAS program should use the SQL Pass-Thru functionality rather than a libname reference. However when linking to a defined external data source in the SAS Metadata from SAS Information Maps, the
What do men really want? What do women really want? If you seek answers to these eternal questions go watch Oprah or Dr. Phil – I don’t really care. They are not nearly as interesting as the question: What do forecasting software buyers really want? Organizations spend millions of dollars
This morning kicks off F2009, the fourth annual Business Forecasting Conference held at SAS world headquarters in Cary, NC. We are again hosting a broad mix of thought leaders, academic researchers, and industry and government practitioners. Pre-registration included 230 attendees spanning 79 commercial organizations, government agencies, and universities, from an
Did Hippocrates really say this? Probably not, for among other reasons he spoke Ancient Greek and not Modern English. However, such mere technicality should not distract us from the importance of this oath for forecasters. Please place your hand over your heart and say with me: First, do no harm.
