CONFERENCE OVERVIEW
 

 

SAS Presenters
2011
Tim Beese
Besse
Tim has been with SAS since 2000 and is the lead developer on the SAS Add-In for Microsoft Office and has been developing the product, from end-to-end, since its inception.
Tips and Techniques for Automating the SAS Add-In for
Microsoft Office with VBA

Do you want to run SAS stored processes in Excel and set the prompt values from your worksheet? Do you want to filter your SAS data sets based on the values of specific cells? Do you want to customize your Microsoft Office content with buttons and other controls which allow you to open data, run SAS code and refresh results? This is now possible!

The SAS Add-In 4.3 for Microsoft Office adds many new features that allow users to interact with their content through Visual Basic for Applications. Users are able to insert and refresh data, stored processes, and reports using VBA. It is also possible to provide prompt values to stored processes, filter and sort strings for data, and control where results are displayed. Combining these features with the existing functionality provided by VBA inside of Microsoft Office, integration of SAS within Microsoft Office will become easier and more powerful!
Kevin Bickford
Kevin Bickford has been with SAS for over 13 years where he has been in various technical roles from Systems Engineer, Manager, Program Manager to his current role as a SR Technical Architect for Customer Loyalty. His focus areas at SAS have been in Enterprise Guide, Enterprise BI and Enterprise Data Integration.
 
He is based in Southern California in the city of Los Angeles.

 Bickford
Turbo-Charging Your Microsoft Office Environment
with SAS Add-In for Microsoft Office 4.3
(Anand V. Chitale)

Presented by Kevin Bickford
One of the most commonly used tools by users of all skill levels across organizations are Microsoft Office tools like Word, Excel and PowerPoint. SAS Add-In for Microsoft Office turbo-charges the world of Microsoft Office tools users by giving them the power to explore and analyse information using SAS software from within their familiar Microsoft Office environment in a more productive manner. SAS’ integration with Microsoft Office brings large set of capabilities enabling users to access reports, stored processes and dashboards, carry out multi-dimensional OLAP analysis in spreadsheets with auto-charting, run interactive reports for quick What-If Analysis and securely work with data directly. Capabilities such as Task Templates and Refresh help users to reutilise the work done thereby increasing user productivity.

This paper will highlight the key capabilities provided by SAS Add-In for Microsoft Office 4.3 and their application across the Microsoft Office products.
Kathy Council
Council
As Vice President of Publications, Kathy Council oversees development and delivery of online and printed documentation and information products that support SAS products globally. Vice President since 1985, Council has headed the Publications unit since originally joining SAS in 1977. She has a bachelor's degree in mathematics from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and a master's degree in statistics from North Carolina State University in Raleigh, NC.
At Your Service: Your Roadmap to Support from SAS®
At your service. How do you make the most of the products and services from SAS Publishing, SAS Education, SAS Technical Support, and support.sas.com? You have world-class support from SAS at your fingertips. But where do you start? How do you navigate the sea of information available to you from SAS? How do you find the resources that you need to do your job? This paper provides you with practical tips, tricks, and techniques to find exactly what you need to use SAS. You’ll save time, learn about upcoming content, and, best of all, become a more proficient and expert user of SAS. This paper benefits the new user and the seasoned SAS user alike. The intended audience is anyone interested in learning more about how to effectively use the services available from SAS.
Vince Del Gobbo
Vince DelGobbo is a Senior Systems Developer in the Web Tools group at SAS. This group is responsible for developing the SAS/IntrNet Application Dispatcher and SAS Stored Processes. He is the developer for the HTML Formatting Tools and the SAS Design-Time Controls, and is developing other new Web- and server-based technologies, as well as integrating SAS output with Microsoft Office. He is also involved in the development of the ExcelXP ODS tagset. Vince has been a SAS Software user since 1982, and joined SAS in 1992.
 DelGobbo
Creating Stylish Multi-Sheet Microsoft Excel Workbooks
the Easy Way with SAS®
Transferring SAS data and analytical results between SAS and Microsoft Excel can be difficult, especially when SAS is not installed on a Windows platform. This paper explains how to use Base SAS®9 software to create multi-sheet Microsoft Excel workbooks (for Excel versions 2002 and later). You will learn step-by-step techniques for quickly and easily creating attractive multi-sheet Excel workbooks that contain your SAS output, and also methods for working with ODS styles and the ExcelXP ODS tagset. Most importantly, the techniques that are presented in this paper can be used regardless of the platform on which SAS software is installed. You can even use them on a mainframe! The use of SAS server technology is also discussed. Although the title is similar to previous papers by this author, this paper contains new and revised material not previously presented.
An IntrAn Introduction to Creating Multi-Sheet Microsoft Excel Workbooks
the Easy Way with SAS®
Transferring SAS data and analytical results between SAS and Microsoft Excel can be difficult, especially when SAS is not installed on a Windows platform. This talk provides basic information on how to use Base SAS®9 software to create multi-sheet Microsoft Excel workbooks (for Excel versions 2002 and later). You will learn techniques for quickly and easily creating attractive, multi-sheet Excel workbooks that contain your SAS output using the ExcelXP ODS tagset. The techniques that are presented in this talk can be used regardless of the platform on which SAS software is installed. You can even use them on a mainframe! More in-depth information on this topic will also be presented, if time permits.
Randy Guard
Guard
As Vice President of Sales Development and Product Management, Randy Guard leads the product strategy and business development efforts across SAS’ Business Analytics Framework. Randy and his Product Management teams work closely with SAS’ Research and Development organization to define and manage product roadmaps based on market needs and customer input. His responsibility for the SAS portfolio spans data integration, business intelligence, analytics, and business solutions.

Before joining SAS in 2000, Randy served as manager of e-business solutions for BuildNet and was Regional Director for Spectrum Technology Group. Randy began his career with Andersen Consulting (Accenture) where he led systems development and implementation efforts for clients across financial services, retail and consumer packaged goods, utilities, and public sector industries.

Randy Guard holds a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from Duke University.

Analytic Skills = Competitive Advantage
Keynote
As more organizations realize the value of analytics in their decision making, the need for analytical talent increases. So, how can you turn yourself into a more valuable strategic asset? In this presentation, Randy Guard will share ideas on how to develop your skills to increase you analytics savvy. You’ll also learn what SAS is doing for mobile and tablet computing, “big analytics”, software as a service models and more.
Dan Heath
Dan is a Principal Software Developer with SAS Institute, with a B.S in Computer Science from North Carolina State University. He's been with the company over 17 years, working primarily on SAS/Graph and related software.
Heath
Now You Can Annotate your SG Procedure Graphs
Have you ever had a situation where you wanted to add some custom labeling or other graphical feature to your SG procedure output but could not find a way to do it? Even with all of the plot types and features of the SG procedures, you may have run into this situation. Now, with SAS 9.3, you can add these features directly by using the new annotation support in the SG procedures.

The annotation data set definition used by these procedures has been redesigned to take advantage of ODS Graphics functionality. This paper will discuss this functionality in detail, highlighting new features in this system that includes the following:

• Rich text support (including superscripts, subscripts, and Unicode)
• Transparency support for all primitives
• More drawing spaces for easier placement of annotations
Laura Higgins
Higgens
Laura Higgins is a Systems Engineer for JMP, a business unit of SAS. Before joining SAS in 2008, Higgins worked as an ontology engineer for Ingenuity Systems, makers of IPA genomic analysis software. Previously, she was in basic research in biology for 15 years, most recently at NASA. Higgins’ statistical background includes multivariate statistics, genomic data analysis, and experimental design for quantitative genetic and genomic experiments. She has used JMP since 1996.

Higgins received her PhD in biology from the University of Texas at Austin, investigating population genetic questions. She earned a Bachelor of Science in biology from Purdue University.
Create compelling visualizations with geographic data and JMP 9
(Jeff Perkinson)

Presented by Laura Higgens
JMP 9 introduces exciting graphical support for geographic data. In this presentation, you will learn how to use the built-in background maps in any plot of geographic data. You will also see how to connect to a Web mapping service to display specialty maps like satellite images, radar images or roadways. Because JMP 9 can plot geographic shapes based on place names, we’ll demonstrate how to use the flexible architecture to create your own shape files to plot any location, like a floor plan or campus. Lastly, we'll show how to convert SAS map data sets for use in JMP.
Warren F. Kuhfeld
Warren F. Kuhfeld is manager of SAS's Multivariate Models R&D group.  He received his Ph.D. in psychometrics from UNC Chapel Hill in 1985 and joined SAS in 1987.  He has used SAS since 1979 and has developed SAS procedures since 1984.  Warren wrote the 9.2 SAS/STAT Chapter, "Statistical Graphics Using ODS" and the new SAS Press book "The Graph Template Language and the Statistical Graphics Procedures -- An Example-Driven Introduction."
 Kuhfeld
Creating Statistical Graphics with ODS in SAS Software

Effective graphics are indispensable in modern statistical analysis. SAS 9.2 provides ODS Graphics, new functionality used by statistical procedures to create statistical graphics as automatically as they create tables. ODS Graphics is also used by new SAS/GRAPH® procedures that are designed for graphical exploration of data. This tutorial is intended for statistical users and covers the use of ODS Graphics from start to finish in statistical analysis. You will learn how to:

•       Request graphs created by statistical procedures.

•       Use the new SGPLOT, SGPANEL, SGSCATTER, and SGRENDER procedures in SAS/GRAPH to create customized graphs.

•       Access and manage your graphs for inclusion in Web pages, papers, and presentations.

•       Modify graph styles (colors, fonts, and general appearance).

•       Make immediate changes to your graphs using a point-and-click editor.

•       Make permanent changes to your graphs with template changes.

•       Specify other options related to ODS Graphics
HTMLBlue That’s Really, Really Where We’re Going To!
This talk describes the new style of the SAS windowing environment (display manager) including new defaults and the new HTMLBlue style. In SAS 9.3, ODS Graphics is enabled by default, the default destination is HTML, and the default style is HTMLBlue.
Sanjay Matange
Matange
Sanjay Matange is a Senior Development Manager in the Data Visualization Division at SAS.  Sanjay is responsible for the development and support of the ODS Graphics system, including the Graph Template Language (GTL), Statistical Graphics (SG) procedures ODS Graphics Designer and other related graphics applications.  Sanjay’s team is also responsible for development of interactive visualization components used in many SAS Products and Solutions such as Enterprise Miner, Forecast Studio, Risk Analysis, Warranty Analysis and many more.  Sanjay has been involved in the development of graphics software at SAS for over 20 years.  Sanjay has graduate degrees in Computer Science from NC State University.
Using ODS Graphics Designer GUI for High-Quality Graphs
Do you wish you could build high quality graphs using an interactive tool in SAS? Are you tired of exporting your data to third-party software like Excel just to create graphs, and then having to deal with the data limitations and poor quality? What if you could build the graph you need using an interactive GUI application right from the SAS DMS session without having to learn a single line of SAS/GRAPH code, and then run this graph in batch with multiple data sets? If all this sounds too good to be true, then get ready to experience the power and convenience of the ODS Graphics Designer. This interactive application uses the same underlying graphics engine as the rest of ODS Graphics to do all of the above. This hands-on tutorial will introduce you to this new application and take you through the actions of creating some commonly used graphs, and some graphs for the Health and Life Sciences industry.
ODS Graphics for Clinical Research
Half-Day Class
This half-day course presents the techniques to create commonly requested clinical graphs using ODS Statistical Graphics. The course provides recommendations and exampls on which procedure / language / application is suitable for different kinds of clinical graphs. graphs.
Tips and Tricks for SG Procedures and GTL for Clinical Graphs
Did you know you could create an Adverse Event Graph using a Vector Plot? Or, label dosage levels for a medications plot using a Scatter Plot? How do you place a reference line between two values on a category axis? SG Procedures and GTL provide you myriad ways to mix and match statements to create your graphs. What you can achieve is based on creative usage of the statements.

This presentation will include tips and tricks you can use in SG Procedures and GTL programs to build your graphs. We will use examples from Clinical Trials and Health and Life Sciences domains to illustrate the techniques using real world graphs like LFT Panels, Patient Profiles, Adverse Event plots and more. Most examples will use SAS 9.2M3, but this presentation will also include a sneak preview of some powerful new features to be released with SAS 9.3.

Chevell Parker
Chevell Parker is a consultant in the Base, Macro and ODS group within the Technical Support Division. His direct support areas include the Output Delivery System and the XML engine. He joined SAS Institute in 1993 and has been a SAS user for over 18 years.
Parker
The Perfect Marriage: The SAS® Output Delivery System (ODS)
and Microsoft Office
A compatible relationship is one in which the associated entities complement each other’s strengths and compensate for each other’s weaknesses. This relationship is certainly the case when you combine the power of ODS and the flexibility of Microsoft Office. This paper describes how you can create outstanding spreadsheets via the harmonious union of ODS with Microsoft Office applications. The paper explores the relationships among ODS destinations (for example, ExcelXP and MSOffice2K) as well as custom tagsets (for example, the TableEditor tagset). In addition, the paper explains how these components enable you to generate highly presentational spreadsheets.

This paper covers the following topics:

• specific layout techniques such as paneling tables and graphics and positioning output in a worksheet
• common issues (related to styles, cell formatting, and so on) that occur when you export data
• customization of your output in Microsoft Word using the RTF destination and the tagset
• generated output that can be read into Microsoft Access and other Office applications
Let’s Give’em Something to TOC About:
Transforming the Table of Contents of Your PDF File
(Bari Lawhorn)

Presented by Chevell Parker
In PDF files, the table of contents provides a map that helps your audience to navigate the document easily. However, the default table of contents that is generated by the SAS Output Delivery System (ODS) destination, while informative, is fairly utilitarian. Your procedures and DATA steps generate tables and graphs that have meaning to you and your audience. Likewise, the table of contents should also be as meaningful as possible by clarifying the contents of your PDF. This paper explains and demonstrates step by step how to use the following statement, options, and procedures to customize your table of contents:

• the ODS PROCLABEL statement
• the CONTENTS= and the DESCRIPTION= options
• the DOCUMENT destination and procedure
• the TEMPLATE procedure

These SAS procedures, statements, and options provide you with the flexibility and the power to customize your table of contents so that you really leave your audience with something to TOC about!
Andy Ravenna
Ravenna
Andy Ravenna, Technical Training Specialist V, New York Regional Office, has a BS in Chemical Engineering, and an MS in Applied Mathematics; both from NC State University with a minor in Statistics. He has used SAS since 1985 and began teaching in 1988. Andy joined the QA department at the Institute in 1990, providing Technical services beginning 1996 in the Consulting department. In 2000 he started teaching SAS for the Education Division.
Becoming a Better Programmer with SAS Enterprise Guide 4.3
Both existing and new users of SAS are turning to SAS Enterprise Guide to write and run their code. Long-time users are accustomed to typing all their code into the Program Editor window and simply hitting the Submit key. New users do not have this same set of expectations and are more willing to point and click on occasion. But the truth is becoming clear; the winning programmer will be the one who has the expertise to create the best of both worlds--either coding or clicking, depending upon which is more efficient for a given task.

SAS Enterprise Guide 4.3 contains new functionality that can help anyone become a better programmer. These pages address the all-important question: when is it appropriate to code, and when to click? The aim here is to expose new users—as well as those familiar with SAS--to tips and best practices that will allow them to return to the office as better programmers.
Chris Riddiough
Christine Riddiough, Technical Training Specialist 5, Rockville Regional Office, has a BA in Astronomy from Carleton College, and an MS in Astrophysics from Northwestern University. She started teaching SAS for the Education Division in 1991. Before that she had taught science, math and computer programming at colleges in the Washington, DC and Chicago areas. She teaches courses in SAS programming, statistics, grid computing and BI content development and maintains several SAS applications for the SAS Education Division.
 Christine
Making the Most of Your Statistical Analysis with SAS® Programming and the Output Delivery System
Half-Day Class
This seminar teaches students how to use the SAS Output Delivery System to customize the output from their statistical analyses, and how to generate reports based on that output for consumption by business users and other information consumers in their organization.
It starts with a review of ODS basics, focusing on the data destination and using the ODS Output statement. The ODS Trace as a mechanism for determining what output objects are created will be explored. We will then examine some examples of how we can easily capture statistical information and report on it in a concise way. Questions addressed will include:

• Which correlations are statistically significant? – use ODS to output correlation statistics to a data set and then use a data step to eliminate those that are non-significant.
• How can I get predicted values based on parameter estimates? – use ODS to capture parameter estimates and the use them to calculate predicted values.
• How can I compare a series of models from linear regression based on several statistics? – use ODS to capture the statistics and use data step programming and macro to produce a comparison table.
Connie Robison
Connie R

Connie Robison joined SAS in 1991 to work on graphics in the Core subsystem.  After working in several different areas in R&D, she now reviews the SAS architecture and deployment models with SAS Solutions, working to achieve integration and consistency across the products.  Connie has a B.S. in Computer Science from N.C. State University.
Understanding the Anatomy of a SAS Deployment --
What's in My Server Soup?
(Mark Schneider, Donna Bennett & Connie Robison)

Presented by Connie Robison

Do you ever get confused about the pieces of a SAS metadata-based deployment and where they go and what they do? This session will highlight the major components of a metadata-based SAS deployment of solutions and BI and give you an overview of how SAS is standardizing our development and deployment processes to continue to improve integration between SAS software offerings and compatibility between releases.
Maura Stokes
Maura Stokes is an R & D Director in the Statistical Applications Department. She is the development product manager for SAS/STAT software. She is the co-author of the SAS Press book Categorical Data Analysis Using the SAS System. Maura received her DrPH from the University of North Carolina in 1986 and has been working at SAS since 1985. Maura is a Fellow of the American Statistical Association.
Stokes
On Deck: SAS/STAT 9.3
(Maura Stokes, Robert N. Rodriguez & Funda Gunes)

Presented by Maura Stokes
SAS/STAT 9.3, coming soon to a site near you, delivers numerous enhancements to the statistical software. The PHREG procedure supports frailty models for incorporating random effects in Cox regression and the MCMC procedure provides a RANDOM statement to facilitate fitting Bayesian models with random effects. The NLIN procedure has been updated, and the MI procedure offers additional flexibility by providing a fully conditional specification method. The new SURVEYPHREG and HPMIXED procedures are also outfitted with additional capabilities.

This talk reviews the highlights of the 9.2 and 9.22 releases of SAS/STAT software and then describes important 9.3 enhancements with practical illustrations.

Up to Speed with Categorical Data Analysis
(Maura Stokes & Gary Koch)

Presented by Maura Stokes
Categorical data analysis remains a substantial tool in the practice of statistics, and its techniques continue to evolve with time. This paper reviews some of the basic tenets of categorical data analysis today and describes the newer techniques that have become common practice. The use of exact methods has expanded, including additional assessments of statistical hypotheses, conditional logistic regression, and Poisson regression. Bayesian methods are now available for logistic regression and Poisson regression, and graphics are a regular component of many analyses.

This paper describes recent techniques and illustrates them with examples that use SAS/STAT software.
Cynthia Zender
Zender
Cynthia Zender has been with SAS since 1996 as an instructor and course developer. She currently serves as the Curriculum Manager for the Report Writing and Output Delivery System curriculum. She has over 20 years' experience programming and reporting with SAS in a number of different industries such as Education, Public Utility, Telecom, Litigation Support, and Research Support (clinical studies and survey analysis). Cynthia recently finished a book entitled, "Output Delivery System: The Basics and Beyond", co-authored with Lauren Haworth and Michele Burlew.
Practically Perfect Presentations

PROC REPORT is a powerful reporting procedure, whose output can be "practically perfect" when you add ODS STYLE= overrides to your PROC REPORT code. This tutorial will feature several PROC REPORT programs that produce default output for ODS HTML, RTF and PDF destinations. Attendees will learn how to modify the defaults to change elements of PROC REPORT output, such as HEADER cells, DATA cells, SUMMARY cells and LINE output using ODS STYLE= overrides. In addition, attendees will learn how to apply conditional formatting at the column or cell level and at the row level using PROC FORMAT techniques and CALL DEFINE techniques. Other topics include: table attributes that control interior table lines and table borders, use of logos in output and producing "Page x of y" page numbering.

SAS® Style Templates: Always in Fashion
The syntax for style templates changed in SAS® 9.2 and became much easier to use. With the new CLASS statement, there is no need to debate the use of the STYLE statement versus the now defunct REPLACE statement. Yes, the REPLACE statement has gone away, and now we have the CLASS statement. In addition, you can import a CSS file into a SAS style template. All of these exciting new changes add up to stylish and fashionable output using ODS style templates. This paper provides an introduction into the use of style templates in SAS 9.2. Methods of determining the correct style elements will be shown along with several concrete examples of making style template changes. The use of the IMPORT statement will also be demonstrated. In addition to these topics, a job aid will be provided that outlines the most commonly used style elements and their attributes.
SG Procedures and ODS GRAPHICS for the Non-Statistician
Half-Day Class
Do you need to produce simple series plots and bar charts and maybe the occasional box plot? Do you want to generate "small multiple" or paneled charts, as recommended by Edward Tufte? This seminar illustrates how to use the new SG procedures, in particular, SGPLOT and SGPANEL to produce simple plots and bar charts. Primary SGPLOT types covered will be VBAR, HBAR, SERIES, VBOX and HBOX. Once you know the basics of the SGPLOT statements to produce single graphs, learning SGPANEL to created paneled output will be a cinch. Through concrete examples, this seminar will guide you through the basics of producing and customizing simple graphs using the new SG procedures. (Note: The SGSCATTER and SGRENDER procedures are topics that are not covered in this seminar. ) In addition, use of the ODS GRAPHICS statement for setting or changing graph options will be covered.