The SAS output delivery system (ODS) makes it so easy to create great-looking output that many folks forget that you can make it even better. One step that folks often leave out: applying a custom title for HTML output. I'm not talking about the title text that you see as
I can vividly recall my first SAS Global Forum (it was SUGI back then). The year was 1996, the city - Chicago, and it was COLD. We used to have a “Fun Run/Walk” as part of the conference activities, and we literally ran on the snow along Lake Michigan. Some of our attendees
It's great to see so many in attendance for the first-ever Predictive Analytics World. I've heard a lot of interesting talks already (too bad some are in parallel making choices hard). A recap and highlights of the talks I was able to hear and the conversations I had during breakouts
So, you want to do two things at once? When you use SAS Enterprise Guide to create a project, the work items in that project typically run one at a time, in series. For example, consider the following process flow: In this flow, SAS Enterprise Guide will run the tasks
Do you remember the article, "This is your life ... with SAS" from the second quarter 2008 issue of sascom magazine? If you do, you'll remember how much information we were able to pack into two pages with the fun comic-strip format. If you don't remember it or never saw
When I applied for a job at SAS over 15 years ago, I didn't even know what the company did. [Insert dummy joke here.] Most of what I knew about the company came from colleagues at my former workplace who, perhaps in an effort to make themselves feel better, described
The SAS Visual Data Discovery package includes, among other things, SAS Enterprise Guide and JMP. If you are among the growing numbers who use these two software applications together, you might be looking for more ways to integrate the two. Here's one way: a SAS Enterprise Guide task that opens
No, this is not about a super-expensive set of bed linens. It's about the 1000th thread (discussion topic) in the SAS Enterprise Guide discussion forum. This discussion forum began as a pilot program over two years ago, with SAS Enterprise Guide and ODS and Base Reporting among the first two
In her completely random blog entry, AnnMaria says: I can’t see a lot of people who are experienced SAS programmers switching to Enterprise Guide. Yeah, we get that a lot. SAS programmers sometimes resist adopting SAS Enterprise Guide citing these (paraphrased) reasons: "I don't need a point-and-click interface to generate
As a dedicated SAS employee, I take advantage of as many offered perks as I can, and that includes attending the annual SAS Winter Party. My wife and I have not missed one since I started working here, which means that last weekend we attended for the 16th time. Every
If you use SAS for just one purpose, you might be interested to see some of its other uses around your world. This video is also a great link to share with your less-tech-savvy friends/relatives who ask the question: what is SAS and why should I care?
This morning, as I was writing this blog post at the kitchen table, my 5-year old daughter ran into the room from watching “Sesame Street.” She excitedly announced, “Mommy, the letter of the day is R!” Too true. The recent NY Times story on the R programming language, which included
At SAS, our Windows client products (such as SAS Enterprise Guide and SAS Add-In for Microsoft Office) feature hundreds of Windows forms, or dialog windows, implemented with Microsoft .NET. Because we encourage customers to extend our products with their own custom tasks, I wanted to share some tips on how
On the twelfth day of Christmas, analytics gave to me… Twelfth graders passing, Eleven pipes for piping, Ten cards for keeping, Nine nurses nursing, Eight beers for tilting, Seven Days of Swimming, Six bets parlaying, FIIIIIIVE Lion Kings, Four fraud alerts, Three linchpins, Two perfect gloves, AND A TIGER WITH
Saw an interesting Tweet (a post on Twitter) from investor and writer Paul Kedrosky today: "geeks only: five best data visualization projects of the year http://is.gd/cwIk" The link takes you to the FlowingData blog (created by a PhD statistics student in NY), and a post on some amazing examples of
SAS recently appointed a Social Media Manager for the company. Check out Dave Thomas' recent interview here. The interview question that must have been edited out: "So, why did you decide to leave Wendy's?" Just like SAS ("what's a shoe company got to do with business analytics?"), I imagine that
Doug Henschen, Intelligent Enterprise Editor-in-Chief, in a recent blog post, provides his usual insightful analysis of the market as he cuts through the dizzying spin of IBM exec Ambuj Goyal. The general manager of IBM’s information management division questions the value of business analytics in an interview with Intelligent Enterprise.
Today's featured topic on support.sas.com teaches you how to use SAS to work with multiple languages and character sets in a single SAS session. The ability to switch locales and languages "on the fly" depends on the improved support for Unicode within SAS 9.2. Although it's a less heralded component
Today I discovered this thoughtful blog from AnnMaria (I found it by way of her Twitter tweet). I was pleased to see SAS Enterprise Guide in the "wonder" column. Here's the entry: The Dangers and Wonders of Statistics Using SAS.
Jason posted his thoughts on using a netbook with a thin layer of applications to do the stuff that he needs to do: surf the web and work his inbox. But don't underestimate these little machines. Over on the Dell Mini forum there is a discussion among folks who use
Who knew? It turns out that Santa gets more done using SAS. Maybe he even gets his mittens dirty with a little bit of DATA step: data good_kids; set world.allchildren (where=(BEHAVIOR <> "NAUGHTY")); run; title "Nice children"; proc print data=good_kids; run;
You know that game that people play with fortune cookie messages where you add a certain phrase to the end of the message to lend it a whole new meaning? Well, according to this announcement on our SAS support site, you'll be able to play that game with statements about
I'd love to believe that our loyal SAS customers never have to touch a statistical package from another company. Even as I work away in my comfy SAS bubble here in Cary, NC, I occasionally catch wind of stories about SAS customers who need to use data that comes from
From the "how far can we take this metaphor?" department... Want to whet your Thankgiving appetite? Read this blog post from R. L. Burns. The "meat and gravy" section is near the bottom of the post. (Personally, I consider myself the giblets.)
In the long-running television sitcom “Seinfeld,” Jerry’s neighbor (and nemesis) Newman often commented on his job as a U.S. postal worker. Making fun of the mail; and post office; was a recurring theme. In the show’s final season, one episode was even titled “The Junk Mail I was reminded of
In addition to writing code, SAS R&D developers are very accustomed to writing poems. I don't mean rhyming poetry like sonnets (though we do hear the occasional randy limerick). When a developer wants to make a code change in a SAS product, he or she is required to complete a
I saw an article this morning about the "world's most stupid bug" found in the firmware of a G1 phone. This flaw makes the phone interpret certain keywords in your text messages as system commands (among them: "reboot" to cause a system reboot). It reminds me of that quirky villian
Have you ever glanced through the obituaries and felt stunned to recognize an old friend? That's how it felt when I saw this announcement about Windows 3.11. One of my first assignments when I joined SAS in 1993 was to write Changes and Enhancements to the SAS System Release 6.10:
Tired of all the depressing news about the economy? Me too. That’s why it was oh so refreshing to hear some good news this past week. I got a firsthand look into how SAS is helping companies weather -- and in some cases, thrive – in our current "challenging" economy.
I see some donors looking at me. At least, that's how I read the last paragraph of this piece about SAS in the local Raleigh newspaper today: WWF, a global conservation group, uses SAS software to determine which potential donors to contact, and how frequently. One recent campaign boosted WWF's
