Useful SAS Links PhilaSUG

8/8/2019 Useful SAS Links PhilaSUG

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Useful SAS Web Links

Presented by Michael Davis

Health Market Science

At PhilaSUG Meeting held on June 17, 2008

hosted by The Hartford Customer Services Group


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Topics to be Covered

How to navigate SAS Support site

Documentation

Notes and samples

Submitting questions to SAS Tech Support

Focus Area and Forums

SAS Training

SAS Books

Using SAS-L Listserv for unofficial answers

Mining SAS conference proceedings

SUGI/SGF

Regional/Special InterestOtherweb sites of interest to SAS users

PhilaSUG and other local SAS user groups

Regional SAS User Groups

SCONSIG.com and other specialized sites


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support.sas.com

A portal for help in using SAS software (vs marketing info)

Site updated in October 2007 (breaking links, dropping features)

Knowledge Base contains documentation, papers, samples,

SAS Notes and Focus Areas

Supportallows one to submit a problem, check track status, andread/post to discussion forums

Learning Centeris the link to the bookstore and training

Communityis the link to user groups, conferences,web

seminars, discussion forums, and sasCommunity.org (wiki)

Tip: Google site:sas.com


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support.sas.com


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Product Documentation Release 9.1.3

Link to Release 9.1.3 is

SAS Procedures

Find procedures across products alphabetically

Cut & paste from Examples to save typosTask Statement section often point to needed feature(s)

Base SAS

See SAS Language Reference: Dictionary for help with data set options,

formats, functions, and statements

See online manuals for SQL programming, macro language, ODS, andrunning SAS under windows (SAS Companion)

OtherTips

Use Search dialog when clueless

Use PDF manual when printing a section

http://support.sas.com/onlinedoc/913/docMainpage.jsp


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Procedures Documentation


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Product Documentation Release 9.2

Link to Release 9.2 is

Click on a topic (e.g. SAS Reference)

Click on a subtopic (e.g. Functions)

Click on a book (e.g. SAS Language Reference: Dictionary)

Choose to view in HTML or as a PDF

Expand tree on left to drill to topic of interest

Most of the topics of interest toprogrammers can be found under

SAS Reference

http://support.sas.com/cdlsearch?ct=80000


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Samples and SAS Notes

Samples and Notes are now intertwined into a Knowledge Base

No more Tech Support FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions)

Tips for Searching Samples and SAS Notes

Select Samples, Usage Notes, and/or Product NotesBrowse by suggested topics, then refine result

Use drop-down filters to winnow results

Other search tips

Use minus, -, to exclude search terms

Prefacing terms with title: restricts search to title

Enclose terms in quotes to return exact phrases

http://support.sas.com/kb


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search KB for pipe samples


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Submitting Problems via the Web

Why use web instead ofphone?

Submit problems when SAS Tech Support phones closed

Get best consultant for your question

Consultants can work on problem during phone duty

Link is

Site number changes for Release 9.2

Phone # is prefixed by country code (+1)

Check Problem Status links to Tracks system

Encapsulate yourproblem before sendingFaster resolution If your problem can be replicated by SAS

Supply data through DATALINES (CARDS) or SASUSER sample data

Strip out non-relevant portions before send

Your problem may go away when non-relevant code is removed !

http://support.sas.com/ctx/supportform/index.jsp


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SAS Focus Areas

Created by SAS R&D to share information about both new andexisting products. Link is

Mostly a mechanism to push papers, sample, code, and tipsabout a product or subject to users

At the bottomof each page is a mailto: link to send comments and

questions back to that R&D areaBase SAS covers DATA Step, ODS, SAS9 features, FAQs (frequentlyasked questions, also in SAS Notes)

Other focus areas include Data Visualization, Migration, Scalability,Statistics, and SAS AppDev Studio

Sending mail to is an alternative to posting questions to

R&D about ODS if the question relates to obscure ODS featuresThe mailto: link is also a good alternative if you are having problems withan experimental feature of SAS

Web section, which covered SAS/IntrNet is gone. See

http://support.sas.com/rnd/

[email protected]

http://support.sas.com/documentation/onlinedoc/intrnet


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SAS Discussion Forums

Link:

Unlike SAS-L, SAS employees allowed topost to forums

New forums for SAS Procedures and SAS Macro Facility

One of the forums is devoted to Enterprise Guide

Most popular forums include ODS and Base Reporting

Unlike SAS Tech Support, conversation is public so avoid posting

proprietary information

http://support.sas.com/forums/


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SAS Discussion Forums


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SAS Training

Top level link is

Search for scheduled public and Live Web courses at:

Want to learn about SAS or Enterprise Guide for free?

Want to experiment with SAS on your home computer?

How do I get tomy local SAS office or see the courses offered at

my local SAS Office?

support.sas.com/training

support.sas.com/training/us

www.sas.com/apps/elearning/elearning_courses.jsp?cat=Free+Tutorials

support.sas.com/learn/le/index.html

support.sas.com/training/fyi


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What is SAS-L?

A LISTSERV based world-wide SAS discussion group that is

always open

Can post and search posted messages to the groupvia e-mail or

via a web interface. Link:

Good for best practices and advice that falls outside the range oftopics that SAS Tech Support addresses

Examples: SAS interview questions, ways to read MS Office documents

into SAS, problem setting up pipes to read Zip, GZ archives

When posting problems, include platform, SAS version, SAS Log

messages, meaningful subject line, and sample data ifpossible so

problem can be replicated

SAS-related jobs are posted on SAS-L

Not a good venue for questions involving proprietary information

listserv.uga.edu/archives/sas-l.html


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SAS-L Archives


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Post About PharmaSUG Proceedings


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sasCommunity.org

a global online SAS Community (Wiki) for SAS users

created by the SAS Global Users Group Executive Board

intended to be single entry point for SAS resources

can search entries via a Google appliance on the site

Can watch a page to be notified of changes

navigate via the main menu on the left

many SAS-related forums and blogs

Sasopedia is anotherway to find some of the links mentioned in

this presentation and more

Opportunity Registry has replaced the job referral binders at

SUGI/SGF

sasCommunity.org is a work-in-progress

remember that anyone can alter an entry!!!


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Mining Conference Proceedings

Presentations at regional and SUGI/SGF SAS conferences have

been published as PDF documents forover a decade and are

freely available via the web

Good source ofmini-tutorials and how-to information

Invited vs contributed presentationsSearch SUGI and SGF (SAS Global Forum, formerly SAS Users

Group International)proceedings at:

Tip: check out contributed paper award winners

e.g.Search SUGI/SGF and regional conference proceedings at:

http://support.sas.com/events/sasglobalforum/previous/online.html

http://www2.sas.com/proceedings/forum2008/Awards07.pdf

http://www.lexjansen.com


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SAS Authored Conference Presentations

Invited conference papers verses SAS Presents

SAS Technical Papers:

Focus area have SAS presentations organized by R&D orproduct

area:

support.sas.com/resources/papers

http://support.sas.com/rnd


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Local SAS User Groups (LUGs)

Most local SAS user groups maintain a website:

Past and future meeting agendas and sign-up

Newsletters

Past presentations

Local SAS employment opportunitiesOther useful links

Good example of LUG websites

User Groups on SAS Web site:Find groups, see upcoming meetings

Find [vertically oriented] special-interest user groups

http://www.philasug.org

http://www.hasug.org

support.sas.com/usergroups


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Regional SAS User Groups

Raison d'tre of regional user groups is their annual conference

and theirwebsites reflect this narrow focus

NESUG also offers speaker-sharing funds

Membership in regional user groups is through affiliated LUGs

Primary source for learning about upcoming conferences

NESUG website has good FAQs section

Links topast conference proceedings on regional sites

Lex Jansen site can search past proceedings for single region


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SCONSIG website

SAS Consultant Special Interest Groupweb site

Link:

Many features of interest to general SAS community

Information on SAS-L

List of SAS training companiesBook reviews

Tips and Techniques

Many links to SAS jobs and job searching

Some non-SAS related information and links

Some of the links are obsolete

http://www.sconsig.com


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SCONSIG.comweb site


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Conclusion

The web offers many resources for solving SAS problems and

learning how to use new SAS features

Available 24x7

Links often shift but with some persistence, you can find the

information that you seek or remember seeing

Questions or comments? Please forward them to:

Telephone: 484-804-2703

[email protected]

http://healthmarketscience.com

Useful SAS Links PhilaSUG

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