Pre-conference Seminars & Statistical Tutorials
Pre-Conference Activities
You can extend your educational opportunities in a number of ways at SAS Global Forum 2008. Sign up to participate in a Pre-Conference Seminar, Statistical Tutorial or one of the pre- or post-conference SAS Training classes. (Note: Available with the Conference Plus Package.)
Seminars and Statistical Tutorials
Sunday, March 16
Two types of educational opportunities are available Sunday, March 16, at the
conference.
- Statistical Tutorials cost $95 each and include relevant handouts. SAS R&D staff will teach all Statistical Tutorials.
- Pre-Conference Seminars cost between $125 and $155 each and take place in the morning and afternoon.
- These extra-fee items are only available as additions to a conference registration.
| Pre-Conference Seminars | |||
| Sharpening Your SAS Skills (Fee $155) | Counting the Ways to Excel (Fee $125) |
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| PROC SQL Programming: Beyond the Basics (Fee $155) | Modernizing Your SAS Code, or How To Avoid Becoming a SAS Dinosaur (Fee $125) |
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| Separating the Interface from the Engine: Creating Custom Add-in Tasks for SAS Enterprise Guide (Fee $125) | Fear SAS Graphs No More (Fee $125) |
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| PROC REPORT Basics: Understanding the Building Blocks (Fee $155) | Custom Reporting Using ODS LAYOUT (Fee $125) | ||
| Statistical Tutorials | |||
| 8:00 a.m. - 10:00 a.m. (concurrent offerings) |
10:30 a.m. - 12:30 p.m. (concurrent offerings) |
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| Modern Regression Analysis (Fee $95) |
Introduction to SAS Stat Studio for SAS/STAT Users (Fee $95) | ||
| Introduction to Bayesian Analysis Using SAS Software (Fee $95) | Creating Statistical Graphics with ODS in SAS 9.2 (Fee $95) |
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Details:
Morning Seminars
8:00 a.m. - 11:30 a.m.
- Sharpening Your SAS Skills
Instructor: Sunil Gupta, Quintiles
Book – Sharpening Your SAS SkillsReady to gain that competitive edge in your SAS career or by taking the SAS Base Programming exam? Learn how to read, understand and write better SAS programs. Understand the key differences between similar SAS syntax and programming approaches. Save time in writing SAS code with organized summaries of important facts. Improve your trouble-shooting skills in common programming and data related problems.
This course shows how to write and diagnose the most common programming tasks in data access and data management. Each example will help you to better understand the SAS syntax by showing results expected from the input data and potential errors, notes or warning messages that may be generated if written incorrectly. This class also includes a review of sample test questions to help you better understand and pass the exam. Take your knowledge to the next level with practical tips and frequently asked questions. Students will receive the course notes and a copy of the Sharpening Your SAS Skills book.
- PROC SQL Programming: Beyond the Basics
Instructor: Kirk Lafler, Software Intelligence Corp.
Book – PROC SQL: Beyond the Basics Using SASExpand your PROC SQL skills beyond the basics with this PROC SQL programming techniques seminar. The instructor will present numerous examples of this powerful database language to improve your mastery of the procedure while providing a better understanding of the language details to perform more complicated tasks. Topics include using case expressions, strategies for creating and using views, performing complex queries with joins and set operators, concepts for creating and using indexes, debugging techniques (including documented and undocumented features), implementing table integrity constraints, and query performance tuning strategies. A copy of the book PROC SQL: Beyond the Basics Using SAS is included in the fee.
- Separating the Interface from the Engine: Creating Custom Add-in Tasks for SAS Enterprise Guide 4.1
Instructor: Peter Eberhardt, Fernwood Consulting Group
Enterprise Guide 4.1 provides a ton of tasks to tickle travels into the world of data exploration and presentation. However, there are times when our fancy is not tickled just as it should be. Perhaps you need a front end to existing SAS reports, or perhaps you need a dynamic lookup screen. Whatever the need, developing a custom adds-in task may be the answer. This seminar will show you how to create custom tasks for use in SAS Enterprise Guide and the add-in for Microsoft Office using C# .NET. It will guide you through the tools you need to get started and then dive right into the programming. You do not need to know much about SAS Enterprise Guide or the add-in for Microsoft Office; however, you should have at least a rudimentary knowledge of object-oriented languages, preferably Microsoft's C#.
- PROC REPORT Basics: Understanding the Building Blocks
Instructor: Art Carpenter, California Occidental Consultants
Book – Carpenter's Complete Guide to the SAS REPORT ProcedureThe presentation of data is an essential part of virtually every study and there are a number of tools within SAS® that allow the user to create a large variety of charts, reports, and data summaries. PROC REPORT is a particularly powerful and valuable procedure that can be used in this process. It can be used to both summarize and display data, and is highly customizable and highly flexible. Unfortunately for many of those just starting to learn PROC REPORT, the terms "customizable" and "flexible" often seem to be euphemisms for "hard to learn". Fortunately PROC REPORT is NOT as hard to learn as it appears. All you really need to have in order to get started is a basic knowledge of a few primary statements. In this introduction to PROC REPORT you will learn to use the primary statements and their key options. Covered statements include: PROC REPORT, COLUMN, DEFINE, BREAK, RBREAK, and COMPUTE. Discussion will include the relationships of these statements and their interaction with the execution phases of the procedure.
The seminar is based on the SAS Press book Carpenter's Complete Guide to the SAS® REPORT Procedure, and will cover the first 5 chapters:
- Creating a Simple Report
- PROC REPORT: An Introduction
- Creating Breaks
- Only in the LISTING Destination
- Creating and Modifying Columns using the Compute Block
Time permitting the course may also include selected examples from Chapter 6: Refining our Understanding of the PROC REPORT Step.
Seminar attendees will receive a copy of the book Carpenter's Complete Guide to the SAS® REPORT Procedure.
Statistical Tutorials
8:00 a.m. - 10:00 a.m.
- Modern Regression Analysis
Instructor: Randy Tobias, SAS
Nonparametric and robust modeling are widely employed in modern regression analysis. Nonparametric analysis is used to model data for which knowledge of the underlying model is limited. Robust parametric or nonparametric methods are appropriate when data contains outliers. This workshop is intended for a broad audience of statisticians and data analysts who are interested in modern regression methods.
The first part of the workshop describe these methods and SAS tools for fitting into the following:
- Robust local regression models with the LOESS procedure.
- Robust parametric models with the ROBUSTREG procedure.
- Quantile regression models with the QUANTREG procedure.
- Mixed model smoothing with the GLIMMIX procedure.
- LASSO/LAR regression models with the GLMSELECT procedure.
The second part of the workshop illustrates the use of these tools with several examples. Topics include controlling the amount of smoothing in nonparametric methods and choosing appropriate robust methods to handle outliers.
This tutorial requires an understanding of basic regression techniques.
- Introduction to Bayesian Analysis Using SAS Software
Instructors: Maura Stokes and Fang K. Chen, SAS
Bayesian methods have become increasingly popular in recent years in a number of different disciplines. This tutorial provides an introduction to Bayesian methods with applications in the areas of the generalized linear model and survival analysis. The first part of the course provides an overview of Bayesian methodology, including motivation and Bayesian inference, as well as computational methods and convergence diagnostics relevant to the SAS implementation. The second part of the course discusses applications using new capabilities in SAS/STAT software in the GENMOD, LIFEREG and PHREG procedures which are based on Gibbs sampling. Examples will include methods such as linear regression, logistic regression, Poisson regression, Cox regression, parametric survival models, and the piecewise exponential model. Note that these enhanced procedures are available as downloads for the 9.1.3 release of SAS software.
A master's level knowledge of statistics is assumed as well as experience with generalized linear models and survival analysis. Previous exposure to Bayesian methods is useful, but not required.
- Introduction to SAS Stat Studio for SAS/STAT Users
Instructor: Rick Wicklin, SAS
Stat Studio 3.1 is new statistical software in SAS 9.2. It provides a highly flexible programming environment in which you can run SAS/STAT software or SAS/IML® software analyses, and display the results with dynamically linked graphics and data tables. You can also call SAS procedures from an IML program. SAS Stat Studio is intended for data analysts who write SAS programs to solve statistical problems, but need more versatility for data exploration and model building.
This workshop introduces SAS Stat Studio to SAS/STAT users. You will learn how to:
- Use the point-and-click features of SAS Stat Studio for analyzing data interactively.
- Write programs that use interactive graphics to display diagnostic statistics computed by SAS/STAT procedures for model assessment and outlier identification.
- Write programs that implement modern statistical methods such as bootstrap algorithms and nonparametric smoothing techniques.
Attendees should have a basic knowledge of SAS/STAT procedures such as FREQ, REG, and LOGISTIC. Experience with SAS/IML is helpful, but not required.
- Creating Statistical Graphics with ODS in SAS 9.2
Instructors: Robert Rodrigues and Jeff Cartier, SAS
Effective graphics are indispensable in modern statistical analysis. SAS 9.2 provides new functionality, referred to as "ODS graphics," which is being used by more than 50 statistical procedures to create statistical graphics as automatically as they create tables with ODS (the Output Delivery System). This functionality is also used by new SAS/GRAPH® procedures that are designed for graphical exploration of data.
This workshop is intended for statistical users and covers the use of ODS graphics from start to finish in statistical analysis. You will learn how to:
- Use the new SGPLOT, SGPANEL, and SGSCATTER procedures in SAS/GRAPH.
- Request graphs created by statistical procedures.
- Access and manage your graphs for inclusion in Web sites, papers, and presentations.
- Change graph styles.
- Enhance your graphs using a point-and-click editor.
- Make permanent modifications to your graphs with basic template changes.
Afternoon Seminars
1:00 p.m. - 4:00 p.m.
- Counting the Ways to Excel
Instructor: Cynthia Zender, SAS
Do you need to output SAS data sets or procedures to Excel? Do you know whether you're using the right technique for your requirements?
This seminar outlines all the ways to get information from Base SAS to Excel. The method you choose depends on whether you're dealing with a SAS data set or SAS procedure output. Topics include using the SAS Excel Libname engine; using PROC EXPORT; and using ODS to create CSV, HTML and XML files that can be opened by Excel. The instructor will provide a brief overview of non-SAS technology, such as DDE and ODBC. She will also provide relevant SAS code for the Base SAS techniques. Selected non-SAS techniques will be discussed, but not demonstrated.
- Modernizing Your SAS Code, or How to Avoid Becoming a SAS Dinosaur
Instructor: Warren Repole, SAS
This seminar can be considered a historical "What's New in SAS" discussion with task-based examples that allow experienced SAS programmers to identify and implement techniques that were added since those programmers first learned to use SAS software and permit less experienced users to understand code that was composed prior to their initiation as SAS programmers.
The content compares older and newer techniques for completing specific SAS programming tasks such as: concatenating two SAS data sets using a DATA step SET statement versus using the APPEND procedure; importing a Microsoft Excel worksheet versus using the corresponding SAS/ACCESS LIBNAME engine; and creating a combination bar chart-line graph using the SAS/GRAPH Annotate facility versus running the GBARLINE procedure
- Fear SAS Graphs No More
Instructor: Michelle Buchecker, SAS
Admit it, you have a juicy little secret. You love writing SAS code, well, everything except PROC GCHART that is! Have you seen the size of the documentation for that? So you sneak away to Excel, manually input the number from PROC MEANS/SUMMARY, print it off and hope no one is the wiser. And then do it all over again next month with new numbers. I know, I've been there (and I work for SAS... shhh!!!). This seminar will show you how to break those chains and use SAS Enterprise Guide as an easy point and click interface to create the graph. This also makes the process repeatable AND you can still make use of your wonderful SAS programming skills to customize titles and footnotes.
- Custom Reporting Using ODS LAYOUT
Instructors: Scott Huntley and Dan O'Connor, SAS
The seminar will compare various methods available for organizing and placing multiple pieces of SAS output on the same page. In the evolution of SAS products, the GREPLAY procedure from SAS/GRAPH® software was the first tool available for organizing multiple pieces of output on the same page. As long as the output was created with a graphic routine, the graphic display area could be divided into a set of sections with graphic output in each one. In the SAS® Intelligence Platform, this kind of processing can be performed with SAS® Web Report Studio. Another approach uses ODS LAYOUT and ODS REGION statements with the ODS PDF destination. This tool is part of Base SAS® software and can organize and display both text-based and graphic output in the same area. The seminar will focus on the syntax needed and results that can created using ODS REGION and ODS LAYOUT. The lecture will also look at ways to improve the appearance of the basic results created by this tool. The SAS code that has been created will be converted into a parameterized SAS® Stored Process that will automatically create output of various forms without having to edit or maintain the underlying syntax. The presentation will end with Questions and Answers, and a list of the references used and the documentation available for the features presented in the seminar.
This course covers an experimental SAS feature. It is possible that syntax and functionality will be different in the production release.