Do you have dozens (or even hundreds) of SAS data sets that you want to read into SAS/IML matrices? In a previous blog post, I showed how to iterate over a series of data sets and analyze each one. Inside the loop, I read each data set into a matrix
A friend of mine was telling me a story the other day. Since we live in a 140-character world, I'll summarize it: Basically, boy meets girl, boy goes to New Zealand to spend two weeks with girl, girl comes home and tells boy that she actually met someone else and
I travel to many conferences throughout the year, and I’ve heard a lot of keynote speeches. Many of them stick with me for a few hours. But one speech I heard three years ago stuck with me for weeks. And then I heard it again at a regional conference. I
From an Enterprise Guide user's perspective, a SAS library is a library. Whether it was defined in the autoexec or in the metadata or by magic, it is there for them to use with no issues. However, there is a difference as metadata defined libraries do not behave in the
One of my favorite features of SAS/IML 12.1 (released with 9.3m2) is that the USE and CLOSE statements support reading data set names that are specified in a SAS/IML matrix. The IMLPlus language in SAS/IML Studio has supported this syntax since the early 2000s, so I am pleased that this
Marketing optimization has never been more critical because it's never been more important for marketers to know the decisions we make are the best ones. The need is driven by globalization, the accelerating pace of technological change, ever-scarcer resources, and so many other factors. In this environment, leading companies are increasingly
Spend time with educators and a few simple truths emerge: There is never enough time, resources are constrained, requirements grow more complex, and so on, and so on. If you travel to enough education-related conferences, the refrains become all too predictable. Yet at these same conferences, you learn about people
This week's SAS tip is from Michele Burlew and her latest book SAS Hash Object Programming Made Easy. Michele is the author of several extremely helpful SAS books. Visit her author page to read free chapters and for additional bonus content. The following excerpt is from SAS Press author Michele
The truncated normal distribution TN(μ, σ, a, b) is the distribution of a normal random variable with mean μ and standard deviation σ that is truncated on the interval [a, b]. I previously blogged about how to implement the truncated normal distribution in SAS. A friend wanted to simulate data
In previous versions of SAS, if you wanted to experiment with creating U.S. maps in Proc GMAP, there wasn't any good sample data available. Unless you had your own data available, you probably ended up using the maps.us x/y points as your DATA= ... which is sort of a nonsense
Would you like to know how some of the largest and most successful organizations are getting value from their big data? Tune in to AllAnalytics.com today at 2 p.m. ET (US) to find out. In their recently published research report, Big Data in Big Companies, renowned analytics thought-leader Tom Davenport
Christina Harvey recently forwarded this question from SAS user Bob Wasicak to several administrators here at SAS: “Does the metadata layer capture the number of login's per user? And how can I get at it? I have been using the metadata browser but would like to write a query to extract
Tofu can be a great addition to your protein rotation. I love tofu! I've been eating it for almost 20 years and have tried it almost any way you could think of. I am always amazed when people turn up their nose at tofu, and they’ve never even tried it!
This article describes how to implement the truncated normal distribution in SAS. Although the implementation in this article uses the SAS/IML language, you can also implement the ideas and formulas by using the DATA step and PROC FCMP. For reference, I recommend the Wikipedia article on the truncated normal distribution.
We know that it is a struggle to gain insight from massive amounts of data. Businesses need the value that analytics provide and want to include analytics in day-to-day decision making in order to gain insights and improve business performance. Data visualization and reporting are like the “easy button” for businesses
Marketers – like most people – like to see their accomplishments in some sort of visual representation. We are a profession who lives in PowerPoint, prezi or some other sort of tool that makes what you are working on look really, really good – sometimes – better than it really
Professional development, popularity, untold fame: the benefits of submitting a paper to a SAS conference are certainly varied and widespread! In a recent SAS Users LinkedIn discussion started by David Corliss, avid SAS users and former presenters discussed their motivations for writing, researching and presenting papers. From the many wonderful
Over the past six months, my free time was devoted to training. This impacted my blog posting frequency but the training helped me successfully complete the inaugural Raleigh Ironman 70.3 in June. When thinking back through how this happened, I noticed many parallels to successfully implementing software for organizations. If
There are many techniques for generating random variates from a specified probability distribution such as the normal, exponential, or gamma distribution. However, one technique stands out because of its generality and simplicity: the inverse CDF sampling technique. If you know the cumulative distribution function (CDF) of a probability distribution, then
How do you like your sandwich? On rye, whole wheat or white bread? What fillings and dressings do you like? You probably think I’ve gone completely crazy and I don’t blame you. What does food have to do with SAS, you say? Loads -- as you’ll find out with this
As a somewhat healthy and active guy, I pay attention to — and sometimes shake my head at — product packaging that boasts “40 percent less fat” or “all natural ingredients.” When you look at the fine print, it tells a more complete story. Yes, there might be a percentage
SAS Global Forum is a three-day, education-focused and energy-packed conference – created by SAS users, for SAS users. Next year’s event will be in Washington D.C., March 23-26. Featuring the best and brightest SAS users and experts from all over the globe, SAS Global Forum 2014 offers the SAS community the chance
We’ve all seen those climactic movie scenes, where the hero of the story figures out how to “save the day” with only minutes to spare. Imagine a rogue CIA operative dashing into a situation room with the last-ditch information that averts nuclear war – and, as always, succeeding. Nothing says
Thanks for joining us for the final post in our series detailing out the Integrated Marketing Management visual that describes what it takes for marketing departments to deliver long term profitable growth to their organizations. In our previous posts we detailed the full visual, and then the first two sections
ODS graph styles provide users with an easy way to control things such as the colors and fonts used in a graph, freeing the user from having to specify these properties in their code. A lot of thought was given to picking colors that work well together, and look good. The
I love tables. As a writer, there's nothing more satisfying to me than distilling complicated information into neat rows and columns. That's one of the features that caught my eye in SAS User ID and Password Usage Rules. The other is its potential usefulness for SAS administrators who manage SAS
In a previous article I discussed how to bin univariate observations by using the BIN function, which was added to the SAS/IML language in SAS/IML 9.3. You can generalize that example and bin bivariate or multivariate data. Over two years ago I wrote a blog post on 2D binning in
You’ve probably caught on by now that I live in the DC-metro area and suffer daily through the misery of congestion. Before I even reach for my keys, I check for the latest information from regional transportation agencies, especially Metro, to devise my plan of attack. Going way beyond the
In the first two posts in this series, Seeing the Light: How SMBs are Using Data and Insights to Get Ahead, I shared the motivations that prompted three SMBs to replace spreadsheets and intuition with a more sophisticated, analytics-driven approach to run their businesses. In the second, I discussed the
It is often useful to partition observations for a continuous variable into a small number of intervals, called bins. This familiar process occurs every time that you create a histogram, such as the one on the left. In SAS you can create this histogram by calling the UNIVARIATE procedure. Optionally,
