Rick Wicklin, PhD, is a distinguished researcher in computational statistics at SAS and is a principal developer of SAS/IML software. His areas of expertise include computational statistics, simulation, statistical graphics, and modern methods in statistical data analysis. Rick is author of the books Statistical Programming with SAS/IML Software and Simulating Data with SAS.
This article uses graphical techniques to visualize one of my favorite geometric objects: the surface of a three-dimensional torus. Along the way, this article demonstrates techniques that are useful for visualizing more mundane 3-D point clouds that arise in statistical data analysis. Define points on a torus A torus is
Rotation matrices are used in computer graphics and in statistical analyses. A rotation matrix is especially easy to implement in a matrix language such as the SAS Interactive Matrix Language (SAS/IML). This article shows how to implement three-dimensional rotation matrices and use them to rotate a 3-D point cloud. Define
Occasionally on a discussion forum, a statistical programmer will ask a question like the following: I am trying to fit a parametric distribution to my data. The sample has a long tail, so I have tried the lognormal, Weibull, and gamma distributions, but nothing seems to fit. Please help!! In
Every year near Halloween I write an article in which I demonstrate a simple programming trick that is a real treat to use. This year's trick (which features the CMISS function and the crossproducts matrix in SAS/IML) enables you to count the number of observations that are missing for pairs
When simulating data or testing algorithms, it is useful to be able to generate patterns of missing data. This article shows how to generate random and systematic patterns of missing values. In other words, this article shows how to replace nonmissing data with missing data. Generate a random pattern of
I've written several articles about scatter plot smoothers: nonparametric regression curves that reveal small- and large-scale features of a response variable as a function of an explanatory variable. However, there is another kind of "smoothness" that you might care about, and that is the apparent smoothness of curves and markers
A previous post discusses how the loess regression algorithm is implemented in SAS. The LOESS procedure in SAS/STAT software provides the data analyst with options to control the loess algorithm and fit nonparametric smoothing curves through points in a scatter plot. Although PROC LOESS satisfies 99.99% of SAS users who
Loess regression is a nonparametric technique that uses local weighted regression to fit a smooth curve through points in a scatter plot. Loess curves are can reveal trends and cycles in data that might be difficult to model with a parametric curve. Loess regression is one of several algorithms in
How far away is the nearest hospital? How far is the nearest restaurant? The nearest gas station? These are commonly asked questions whose answers depend on the location of the person asking the question. Recently I showed an algorithm that enables you to find the distance between a set of
The WHERE clause in SAS is a powerful mechanism for selecting observations as you read or write a data set. The WHERE clause supports many operators, including the IN operator, which enables you to compactly specify multiple conditions for a categorical variable. A common use of the IN operator is
