In an earlier blog, I asked you to participate in CertMag/GoCertify’s Annual IT Salary survey. The response was fantastic and I’m happy to report that we made the list of the Top 75 IT certifications out of more than 900. This marks the first time SAS has been part of
Jazz up your Geo Map or Network Analysis graph by applying icon-based display rule markers instead of color markers on the map. With SAS Visual Analytics, you may have already used display rules by populating intervals or adding color-mapped values for report objects. Now, you can jazz up your Geo
Next week I am offering a lunch-and-learn called "Successfully Single: In and out of relationships", but I think I should have titled it "Attractiveness and Self-investment". I am not sure how many people want to be "successfully single", particularly this month when our collective attention is focused on love and
A dual response axis chart is useful when the data type for the multiple measures are not compatible. For example, when overlaying measures like "This Year" sales with "Last Year" sales, the format and magnitudes of the two measures (or values for two groups) may be compatible, and it is
This article simulates the birthday-matching problem in SAS. The birthday-matching problem (also called the birthday problem or birthday paradox) answers the following question: "if there are N people in a room, what is the probability that at least two people share a birthday?" The birthday problem is famous because the
Forecasting Research Survey The Centre for Marketing Analytics and Forecasting at Lancaster University is conducting a new study on how demand forecasters do forecasting. They invite all practitioners who are working with forecasts, such as demand planners and supply managers, to take part in the study. The survey is anonymous
Can felons vote? This seemed like a simple question, but I realized that I wasn't 100% sure of the answer. Therefore I looked into the data ... and apparently "it depends". Follow along and see how I created a map to help answer this question. But before we take the
This is a guest blog by Shelly Hummel, LMFT and Carole Cullen, LMFT as part of the Work/Life February Relationships Series. We offer our sincere thanks to Shelley and Carole for volunteering to contribute! Jennifer and Dave have been married for 3 years. “We have a huge argument every December
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
Do you know what the #1 fear in North America is? Most people say fear of public speaking or fear of death, but you may just want to consider this new fear upping the charts - the fear of writing a SAS Certification exam! The real test begins before even
@philsimon provides more thoughts about the opportunity that GDPR provides marketing departments.
As a former intelligence analyst, I can't help but breathe a huge sigh of frustration. The special AI "task forces" and their massive budgets are great, but it's time to get honest about the rest of the military. Ask any every day soldier, sailor, airman or Marine their opinion of
It seems like almost everyone is sporting a gadget these days to record their every move, as fitness trackers have become increasingly popular over the last several years. While some devices have the ability to recognize mileage, steps, and even sleep patterns, perhaps the most important feedback when it comes
This article shows how to construct a "stacked band plot" in SAS, as shown to the right. (Click to enlarge.) You are probably familiar with a stacked bar chart in which the cumulative amount of some quantity is displayed by stacking the contributions of several groups. A canonical example is
Can you use a data visualization tool to display building maps, floor designs and other Esri data? With the recent addition of custom polygon support in SAS Visual Analytics 8.2, customers wondered if this feature can be utilized to render different types of regional overlays. A common request is to
The flu seems to be especially potent this year. "How potent is it," you might ask? ... Well, let's plot some data on a map to help find out! Here in the US, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) compiles data about diseases, and provides reports and graphs
Sometimes we social worker types in Work/Life forget that other people don't use phrases like "love languages" with the same ease that the typical SAS employee might talk about "data-driven customer experience." In Work/Life we are kicking off a February series on relationships, so I wanted to take a moment to tell
Have you, or someone you know, gotten the flu this year? Word on the street is that this year's flu might be particularly bad, and the data seem to be corroborating that so far. You don't want to take my word for it? -- well then, let's have a look
I ran across an interesting conundrum the other day. The intent was to compare the value of X to a list of desired values, and if X matched one of the values in the list, set Flag to 1, otherwise set Flag to 0. I wrote and executed this test program,
Enochlophobia. It means “fear of crowds,” and I have it. I wouldn’t be caught dead anywhere near Times Square on New Years’ Eve, and how did I ever endure the stadium-sized rock concerts of my youth? I’m thinking all this as I navigate the sea of people at the National
What is a random number generator? What are the random-number generators in SAS, and how can you use them to generate random numbers from probability distributions? In SAS 9.4M5, you can use the STREAMINIT function to select from eight random-number generators (RNGs), including five new RNGs. After choosing an RNG,
Want instant feedback regarding your workout? It’s a numbers game! The fitness industry is making billions off data tracking wearables from Polar to Garmin and beyond. Studios are displaying heart rates on smart screens in classes, in fact, that’s one of the new gadgets we’ve added at the RFC this
Are you interested in using SAS Visual Analytics 8.2 to visualize a state by regions, but all you have is a county shapefile? As long as you can cross-walk counties to regions, this is easier to do than you might think. Here are the steps involved: Step 1 Obtain a
Let’s lay down some fundamentals. In business you want to achieve the highest revenues with the best margins and the lowest costs. More specifically, in manufacturing, you want your products to be the highest quality (relative to specification) when you make the item. And you want it shipped to the
If you have worked with the different types of score code generated by the high-performance modeling nodes in SAS® Enterprise Miner™ 14.1, you have probably come across the Analytic Store (or ASTORE) file type for scoring. The ASTOREfile type works very well for scoring complex machine learning models like random
If Necessity is the mother of Invention, then, perhaps, the father of Automation is Laziness. Automation is all about convenience, comfort, and productivity. Why do it yourself if you can devise something to do it for you! In my previous post Running SAS programs in batch under Unix/Linux, we learned
A chatbot is a computer program that uses natural language processing (NLP) and artificial intelligence to simulate human conversation and derive a response. Essentially, it’s a machine that can chat with you or respond to your chatter. Chatbots can save time and money when used to handle simple, automated tasks.
The 38th International Symposium on Forecasting will be held June 17-20 in Boulder, Colorado, USA. Registration is now open. This is the last ISF in North America until at least 2022. The ISF is the premier forecasting event for researchers, with academic attendees from all over the world. Yet it
Data doesn't always have to be 'big data' to be interesting. For example, I recently ran across a small, but very interesting, database containing all of North Korea's missile tests. The data was a bit difficult to digest in the formats provided, therefore I decided to try my hand at
Most people who work with optimization are familiar with Linear and Integer Programming, to their toolkit they could add Constraint Programming. Constraint Programming is a powerful technique that is used to solve powerful “real-world” problems in a variety of areas, such as, planning, scheduling, DNA Sequencing, computer graphics and natural
