Last month I wrote an article on connecting multiple statistics by category in a box plot using SGPLOT. In the first article I described the way you can do this using overlaid SERIES on a VBOX using SAS 9.4, which allows such a combination. However, if you have SAS 9.3,
.@philsimon provides insights on whether a data strategy can result in competitive advantage.
Are you from Yankeedom, The Far West, or somewhere in between? In this blog, I use SAS maps to explore some fun data about regional cultures in the U.S. I recently ran across an interesting article about Colin Woodward's book "American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures
The New Year is one of my favorite times at the gym. Fresh, ambitious faces show up in their bright new workout clothes and fancy new shoes. There are gadgets – arm bands, Garmin watches, weight gloves, and the latest water bottles. Classes are full. The pool has a slight
In SAS, the aspect ratio of a graph is the physical height of the graph divided by the physical width. Recently I demonstrated how to set the aspect ratio of graphs in SAS by using the ASPECT= option in PROC SGPLOT or by using the OVERLAYEQUATED statement in the Graph
Do any of your New Year’s resolutions include the goal to become a more productive SAS user? Whether you’re building models or reports using SAS or you’re using SAS to effectively manage your data, you likely have a goal to be as productive as possible with your SAS usage in
In Part 1 of this series, Cheryl Doninger described how SAS Grid Manager can extend your investment in the Hadoop infrastructure. In this post, we’ll take a look at how Cloudera Manager helps Hadoop administrators meet competing service level agreements (SLAs). Cloudera Manager lets Hadoop admins set up queues to
This April, thousands of SAS users will converge on Las Vegas for the premier event for SAS professionals: SAS Global Forum. The event will attract users from across the globe; in every industry imaginable; and from countless government and academic institutions. It’s an excellent place to network with and learn
You probably heard the recent announcement this past Friday that Walmart will be closing 269 stores. Are any closing near where you live? This blog shows some really cool SAS maps to let you drill-down into the data! I've seen a few maps showing which Walmart stores are closing, but they
Are you drowning in data? Do you feel overwhelmed -- or underwhelmed -- with the myriad of options available to deal with your data problems? (especially in the area of pricing?) It's the era of big data, and many retailers are discovering that hope is found through new technologies like event stream processing or Hadoop. However, as
"I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been." - Wayne Gretzky I love this quote from Wayne Gretzky. It sums up how most organizations approach data strategy. Data strategy typically starts with a strategic plan laid down by the board. The CEO will
A successful energy savings program is a good thing for utilities, right? The truth is, that success can result in unintended consequences. One of our utility customers shared this example with me recently: "Let’s say we offer a free LED light bulb to every customer, and everyone removes an old bulb that used 75
Parameters in SAS procedures are specified a list of values that you manually type into the procedure syntax. For example, if you want to specify a list of percentile values in PROC UNIVARIATE, you need to type the values into the PCTLPTS= option as follows: proc univariate data=sashelp.cars noprint; var
As support analysts in the SAS Technical Support division, we answer many phone calls from SAS customers. As members of the SAS Foundation team, we get questions that vary significantly in content from all of the areas that we support. We offer coding tips and suggestions as well as point
While 2015 was an unpredictable and often difficult year for many UK retailers, their customers have certainly prospered. The Christmas season, in particular, saw increased discounts for the fifth year in a row. This followed a period when changing weather patterns and price deflation had already offset predicted sales, both in-store and
Announcing New Book: Business Forecasting Just in time for the new year, Business Forecasting: Practical Problems and Solutions compiles the field's most important and thought provoking new literature into a single comprehensive reference for the business forecaster. So says the marketing literature. The real story? The book does pretty much
It’s obvious that an enterprise data strategy involves data – but we sometimes disregard the fact that it should also involve metadata. Why? Because it’s key to unlocking the value of data. Metadata shows you what data is available and how people can use it. It also reveals which data
A customer wants to use PROC REG to fit a simple regression model but display in the fit plot markers that differentiate groups of individuals. Click on a graph to enlarge. Before we see how to do that, let's look at some simpler examples. The following step fits a linear
Health care is undergoing exponential change, and this year we’ll continue to see the industry launch bold missions to improve the patient experience. With new types of data and technologies, the vision of making health care more personalized and proactive is becoming closer to reality. In my new book “The
A number of years ago I was driving home to Alabama for the holidays. Typical of the season the driving was not easy. It was getting dark early and the traffic was fairly heavy. I had the radio on to pass the time. A talk show was on and the
If you are a SAS Administrator who is tasked with managing SAS users including adding and removing SAS users in the SAS Management Console, assigning (or re-assigning) them to Groups and Roles, maintaining their General information and user Accounts, then you know that when number of users grow, at some
With the New Year also comes new beginnings and feelings of a clean slate. With that fresh start, many of us have high hopes of cleaning up our diets and eating more nutritious foods. You’ve probably heard all about the importance of replacing processed carbs with intact, whole grains and
Recently I blogged about how to compute a weighted mean and showed that you can use a weighted mean to compute the center of mass for a system of N point masses in the plane. That led me to think about a related problem: computing the center of mass (called
Let us start the new year by taking a trip back in history to SAS 9.2, first released in 2008, and the first SAS release that included the new ODS Graphics software including GTL and SG procedures. While we have recently released the third maintenance on SAS 9.4 (SAS 9.40M3),
What if a reckless driver adopted a more responsible approach because the car insurance pricing was based on driving habits? What if the senior from next door had the insurance payments based on kilometres driven, resulting in significant savings? This may be reality sooner than you think. The Internet of Things will revolutionise
.@philsimon on the need to play offense and defense with your organization's data.
When SAS Scotland gave students 48 hours to build a prototype computer system to help increase police effectiveness, nine teams accepted the challenge. The venue was the University of Glasgow's Hackathon, one of the largest student hackathons in the UK, attracting 200 attendees. SAS Scotland has co-sponsored the event for the past three
When I walk into my local chicken shop I always feel that Mary, the owner, has roasted chickens, prepared salads and put on extra rice pudding for my family’s Friday night meal. Mary welcomes me with open arms, greets me and my son by first name and always has an
What strategy do you use to pick your lottery numbers? Do you suspect that the future winning numbers might be somehow related to the past winning numbers? If so, this blog's for you! The Powerball lottery jackpot is up to about $1.4 billion - the largest lottery jackpot there has
I began 2016 by compiling a list of popular articles from my blog in 2015. This "People's Choice" list contains many interesting articles, but some of my personal favorites did not make the list. Today I present the "Editor's Choice" list of articles that deserve a second look. I've grouped
