Many optimization problems in statistics and machine learning involve continuous parameters. For example, maximum likelihood estimation involves optimizing a log-likelihood function over a continuous domain, possibly with constraints. Recently, however, I had to solve an optimization problem for which the solution vector was a 0/1 binary variable. To solve the
Just because you are using CAS actions doesn't mean you can forget about the powerful SAS DATA step. The dataStep.runCode CAS action is here! Welcome back to my SAS Users blog series CAS Action! - a series on fundamentals. I've broken the series into logical, consumable parts. If you'd like
Overlapping social issues and additional uncertainties – not to mention a global pandemic - have led to a massive spike in people seeking mental health support. Much of that extra demand has been absorbed virtually. Canada’s Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, for example, has seen its monthly demand for
SCUBA diving is one of those activities that should be on your bucket list - everyone should experience it at least once! But where should you go diving? ... Coral reefs are always popular - and they are typically in shallow water, making it an 'easy' dive. But, being in
With data, we can proactively advocate for changes to systems and policies. See how it's done.
As a fitness and wellness trainer I’m often asked “does taking the stairs really make that much of a difference?” Or “does parking further away in a parking lot count [toward improving health]?” The results are in and, yes, adding more movement into your day really does lead to a
In a matrix-vector language such as SAS/IML, it is useful to always remember that the fundamental objects are matrices and that all operations are designed to work on matrices. (And vectors, which are matrices that have only one row or one column.) By using matrix operations, you can often eliminate
M6 Financial Forecasting Competition The Makridakis Open Forecasting Center has announced the M6 Financial Forecasting Competition, to begin in February 2022. This will be a "live" competition running through February 2023, with a focus on forecasts of stock price (returns) and risk, and on investment decisions based on the forecasts.
An ideal quartet formation of a rock band consists of a voice, an electric guitar, a bass, and a drum kit. What else do we need to enjoy our favorite tunes and get inspired? There's another great quartet that could bring you fresh ideas and that is the insurance industry.
SAS' Udo Sglavo interviews colleague Jan Chvosta, director of Scientific Computing at SAS, on regression analysis and how it works.
Resetting the risk dial – empowering the UK public sector to build back better. Public sector organisations in the UK had to respond rapidly to the pandemic when lockdown was announced in 2020. Policy changes were issued in quick succession and departments had to scramble to implement new solutions safely
“You have to have a left and right-brained approach to marketing. It’s important to leverage data, but you also have to spark creativity and inspiration so you can appeal to the head and heart of your customers.” - Jenn Chase, SAS EVP and CMO The marketing landscape continues to change. Whether
A reader asked whether it is possible to find a bootstrap sample that has some desirable properties. I am using the term "bootstrap sample" to refer to the result of randomly resampling with replacement from a data set. Specifically, he wanted to find a bootstrap sample that has a specific
It is widely recognized that the right price is crucial in insurance. Insurance is what is known as a ‘grudge purchase’: customers know it is necessary, but they hope never to use it. This traditionally and theoretically means that they want to pay as little as possible for their insurance
Early in the pandemic, we used this blog to offer resources for responding to COVID-19, recovering from the economic losses, and reimagining life after the pandemic. By now, everyone has read about testing, contact tracing, social distancing, treatment protocols and vaccines. Whether or not you have had COVID yourself, all
When students hear the word data, they may envision measurements that scientists collect, or perhaps it has something to do with the social media platforms they love. Many students struggle to understand where data comes from and how it can help us make decisions and better understand our world! They may not make a connection with computer science either. Just as
Tired of waiting for answers? Then make your SAS code run faster with these 5 tips.
Since 2015, the number of Americans who to listen to at least one podcast per month has increased by approximately 40 million people. The number of podcast listeners has also ballooned globally in tandem with a rise in smart speaker adoption. People are consuming them at home, on the go
IDC measures advanced & predictive analytics in its annual Worldwide Business Intelligence and Analytics Software Market Shares* report – and has consistently ranked SAS as the #1 market leader for over two decades!
SQL is an important language for any programmer working with data. In SAS Cloud Analytic Services (CAS) you can execute SQL queries using the fedSQL.execDirect CAS action! Welcome back to my SAS Users blog series CAS Action! - a series on fundamentals. I've broken the series into logical, consumable parts.
This June the Work/Life Relationship Series sent emails for three weeks with relationship research, insights and tips. A weekly email also provided questions for conversations and closeness. I'm sure many of us may find ourselves occasionally staring silently at our partners, friends or family, as we continue to endure these
Graphing data is almost always more informative than displaying a table of summary statistics. In a recent article about "dynamite plots," I briefly mentioned that graphs such as box plots and strip plots are better at showing data than graphs that merely show the mean and standard deviation. This article
Tropical Storm Ana, which formed in May this year, officially made 2021 the seventh consecutive year that a storm formed before the season's designated start. Since then we have seen a number of storms, representative of an increase of severe weather over the past few years, especially as we remember
“Bias is not inhuman. To have bias is absolutely human,” says Banu Raghuraman. If data enthusiasts are going to break the cycle of bias, however, “we have to be more aware of where the data is coming from, what it’s trying to tell us and how we can break the
In my previous post CAS-Action! Simply Distinct - Part 1 I reviewed using the simple.distinct CAS action to explore distinct and missing values in a distributed CAS table. Welcome back to my SAS Users blog series CAS Action! - a series on fundamentals. I've broken the series into logical, consumable
Data should alleviate strain instead of causing new pain Recent research from SAS and Accenture underlines what many of us already knew anecdotally. Marketers are increasingly frustrated by their inability to obtain and leverage insights into customer behavior. Marketing teams have data – heaps of data – but they are unable
Word embeddings are the learned representations of words within a set of documents. Each word or term is represented as a real-valued vector within a vector space. Terms or words that reside closer to each other within that vector space are expected to share similar meanings. Thus, embeddings try to capture the meaning of each word or term through its relationships with the other words in the corpus.
“What’s for dinner tonight?” The absolute LAST thing anyone wants to think about after an exhausting day of mind-numbing meetings, traffic jams, juggling kids between after-school activities and tackling homework. So how do you avoid this situation? Meal planning of course…probably the next to last thing anyone wants to think
Written by Valeria Ravani Since the pandemic began, travel has been restricted to help curb the spread of COVID-19. We’re all eager for the days when we can travel again – for work, or for pleasure! Until that time comes, we’re going to take you on a virtual world tour,
The field of probability and statistics is full of asymptotic results. The Law of Large Numbers and the Central Limit Theorem are two famous examples. An asymptotic result can be both a blessing and a curse. For example, consider a result that says that the distribution of some statistic converges
