When I fill up my daily-driver Prius, the price of gasoline isn't that important. But when I occasionally take a trip in my V8 Suburban, I pay a lot more attention! Therefore I was pleasantly surprised when I noticed that gasoline prices have been falling. How much have they fallen,
By now, we're all aware of the seismic shift occurring across industries as a result of the Internet of Things. But do we all see the changes in the same light? From where I sit, there's still a wide gap in viewpoints and perspectives. In its simplest form, we often
The ODS Graphics software, first released with SAS 9.2, supported creating graphs directly from statistical procedures. Prior to this, very few statistical procedures created graphs on their own, and in most cases creating graphs was a post process or creating the graphs from the saved data using SAS/GRAPH procedures. With
The SAS 9.4M6 software includes a new SGPIE procedure (preproduction) as introduced in the recent article - The SGPIE Procedure. In that article, I described the basic features of the two statements supported in the procedure, the PIE and the DONUT, with some examples. It is my humble opinion that
This week I noticed that they've started building the lot where they sell Christmas trees near SAS (at the intersection of Maynard & Reedy Creek Rd). They put up a nice rustic wooden fence, and lights, and maybe even a fire pit to keep their workers warm. They sell some
Who says technical people can't have fun!?! Similar to Throwback Thursday / #TBT (when people post one of their old/nostalgic photos on social media), I like the tradition of Fun Friday when I use a fun data topic to test our software - a test can be just as rigorous using
I attended the Scottish Highland Games this past weekend ... nearby in Scotland County, North Carolina! They put on a great event, with kilt-wearing Scotsmen throwing things, bands playing bagpipes, kids dancing, and clans sharing their family history. And to get into the mood for this event, I decided to
"We been through every kind of rain there is. Little bitty stingin' rain, and big ol' fat rain, rain that flew in sideways, and sometimes rain even seemed to come straight up from underneath." Was that a quote from the Forrest Gump movie, or something said regarding Hurricane Florence? Could be either one! Hurricane Florence recently came through
I started my computer career as a Unix system administrator, and when I began using SAS almost 30 years ago it was only natural that I used it on Unix computers (they were the most powerful/capable computers I had access to at the time). I've picked up a lot of
I can recognize several languages when I hear people speaking them (mostly because I lived in the Alexander International Dorm at NC State University). Therefore when I found a map of the most common languages spoken in each US state, it caught my attention, and I decided to try creating my
The United States declared independence in 1776, and we celebrate it on July 4th every year. But the land areas that make up the United States today weren't necessarily the same as they were back then. So I thought it would be interesting to create a map showing when each
One of my favorite Eddie Murphy movies when I was growing up was Coming to America. And speaking of coming to America, there's been a lot in the news recently about people doing just that. So I thought I'd use my SAS skills to help people wanting to come to
You've probably seen in the news that a volcano erupted in Guatemala recently. But do you really know much about this volcano, or even where it's located? Hopefully this blog post will get you up to speed on your volcanology! Pictures of a recent volcano erupting in Hawaii show slow-moving
Todo se basa en una sencilla teoría económica: cuando los precios de los productos aumentan, la gente no está dispuesta a pagarlos y, en consecuencia, la demanda se va a pique; evidentemente, sucede el efecto contrario cuando se reducen. No obstante, el mecanismo que se activa al modificar dicho valor
Poverty. It's a bit difficult to define who lives in poverty - I guess it's a relative thing, and depends on the standard of living of the people around you. Today we're going to take a look at the child poverty rates in several 'rich' countries (such as the United
Are you going to Denver, Colorado, and wondering what fun/interesting/eclectic things you can do there? Then this is the map for you! For the past couple of years, I've made maps of the city SAS Global Forum is in, pointing out some of the attractions that conference attendees might want
For the past few years, I've been hearing from many news sources that Detroit is the most violent large city in the US. If the news is saying this, then the data should corroborate it, eh? Well, of course I decided to check for myself... When comparing crime data across
As marijuana has become legal in several states, it's been a frequent topic of interest in the news. And as with any interesting topic, I like to find useful ways to visually analyze the data. In this case, let's have a look at the price of marijuana, and how it
Most of us put on a few pounds over the holidays. It's difficult not to, with the holiday dinners, and then all the special desserts, snacks, and candies. But there might also be another source of extra calories that you hadn't thought about - fast-food! Let's have a look at
With the Christmas holiday approaching, I got to wondering what they call Santa in other countries. Of course, some countries don't celebrate Christmas - but most countries at least have some sort of "winter holiday," and most also have some tradition of gift-giving. So, I guess the better question might
Whether or not to legalize marijuana is a hotly debated topic these days. And no matter which side of the debate you're on, I think you will be interested in seeing several ways to visualize which states have legalized marijuana, and when ... Their Version Here's the original graph that
One of the great things about living in an area that has seasons is you get to see the leaves change colors in the fall. If you're a big fan of seeing the leaves at their peak, you could actually travel around the country and see the leaves at their
The South East SAS Users Group meeting wound up yesterday. The 25th anniversary conference was held on SAS Campus and it provided a great opportunity to meet with many enthusiastic SAS users and attend many informative presentations. More on this in a follow-up article. During one of these presentations, Mary
If you plan to travel abroad and see the world, you'll need a passport. And, depending on several factors, you might also need travel visas. Which passports allow you to travel with the least amount of hassle (and the least amounts of visas)? Let's create a map to help you
Quick Quiz! Where might you hear the following conversation? ... Waitress: "What would you like to drink, honey?" Customer: "I'll have a coke." Waitress: "What kind?" Customer: "Diet Pepsi." If you answered somewhere between Texas and Georgia, you would be correct! To those of us not from that area, it
In growing areas such as the Research Triangle Park, there is always the tough decision between developing land for business, or keeping it natural for parks and recreation. SAS is fortunate to have the great hiking trails at Umstead Park just across the road to the north - it's the
Off and on, users have expressed the need to include multiple blank categories on a discrete axis. Often, this is desirable to separate groups of bars (or categories) in a graph due to some difference their definition. Such a case was discussed in this blog article on using non breaking
ODS Graphics procedures primarily strive towards the following goal: "Make simple graphs easy and complex graphs possible". SGPLOT procedure allows you create simple graphs with a single plot statement, and create complex graphs by layering together or combining multiple plot statements. Generally, the appearance follows the guidelines set by industry
I recently took a trip to Scotland, to attend the Highland Games! (ok - that statement might be a tiny bit misleading) It was a very cool and interesting event, and I wondered where and when other such events might be happening. What better way to analyze this kind of
SAS 9.4 maintenance release 5 was released on Sept 19, 2017. This release includes many new items including integration with SAS Viya and SAS Studio, a web application for SAS development. Also Included with this release are some cool new features in the graphics domain, some of which were requested
