Book Reviews

Quick Results with the Output Delivery System (Print on Demand*)

1-59047-163-6

"Quick Results with the Output Delivery System deserves its name. Clearly written and easy to understand, this book will enable readers to produce results without having to wade through a lot of pages or convoluted examples. Using a single simple data set throughout the entire book, Sunil shows readers how to create HTML, RTF, and PDF output, how to select individual pieces of output for reporting or saving as SAS data sets, and how to select an overall style.

Despite the small size of this book, the topics are covered in surprising depth. For example, he shows how to create a bar chart in HTML that brings up detail reports when you click on the individual bars. Sunil does not attempt to cover all of ODS--no mention is made of creating your own overall style or changing individual style attributes with the STYLE= option. This book is not a complete guide to ODS, but that's exactly why beginners or advanced users with limited time will find this book so useful. "

Susan J. Slaughter
Avocet Solutions


"Quick Results with The Output Delivery System is an excellent introductory text that illustrates SAS ODS. Having little experience with SAS ODS, I found this text extremely helpful in understanding how to get SAS to produce reports within the ODS framework. This text is a useful addition to SAS's excellent library of publications.

I liked Gupta's presentation style. He provides a nice balance of process flow and specific examples that give the reader a good introduction of the Output Delivery System. I found this balance very helpful in understanding the aspects of the procedures. His writing is clear and precise. The combination of the writing, SAS Code, and process flow diagrams will give a beginner SAS programmer a good background in ODS. "

William Hewitt, Ph.D.
Senior Project Analyst, Fleet Credit Card Services, a subsidiary of FleetBoston Financial
Adjunct Professor, West Chester University.