SAS Web Applications

The SAS Web applications described in this section have user interfaces that are used by people other than administrators. These applications require a Web browser on each client machine and run in a Web application server that is installed on a middle-tier machine. These applications communicate with the user by sending data to and receiving data from the user's Web browser. For example, these applications display a user interface by sending HTML that includes HTML forms, Java Applets, or Adobe Flash content. The user can interact and submit input to the application by sending an HTTP response, usually by clicking a link or submitting an HTML form.

SAS Web Report Studio

SAS Web Report Studio is a Web application that anyone can use to view, interact with, create, and distribute public and private reports. Reports can be scheduled to run unattended on a recurring basis and then distributed using e-mail. SAS Web Report Studio requires the SAS BI Report Services (which includes the report output generation tool) and the SAS BI Report Services Configuration (which creates libraries used by the SAS Web Report Studio).

SAS Information Delivery Portal

The SAS Information Delivery Portal is a Web application that enables you to aggregate data from a variety of sources and present the data in a Web browser. The Web browser content might include the output of SAS Stored Processes, links to Web addresses, documents, syndicated content from information providers, SAS Information Maps, SAS reports, and Web applications. The portal also provides a secure environment for sharing information with users.

Using the portal, you can distribute different types of content and applications as appropriate to internal users, external customers, vendors, and partners. You can use the portal along with the Publishing Framework to perform the following tasks:

Publish content to SAS publication channels or WebDAV repositories
Subscribe to publication channels
View packages published to channels

The portal's personalization features enable users to organize information about their desktops in a way that makes sense to them.

For more information, see the SAS Information Delivery Portal Help, which is available from within the product.

SAS BI Dashboard

SAS BI Dashboard 4.3 enables users to create, maintain, and view dashboards to monitor key performance indicators that convey how well an organization is performing. SAS BI Dashboard 4.3 includes an easy-to-use, drag and drop interface for creating dashboards that include graphics, text, colors, and hyperlinks. The application leverages Flash in the Rich Internet Application (RIA) architecture.

The Dashboard Viewer enables users to:

Interact with data through interactive highlighting
Quickly get to a subset of data through prompts and filters

Dashboards can link to:

SAS reports and analytical results
Scorecards and objects associated with solutions such as SAS Strategy Management
Stored Processes
Indicators
Virtually any item that is addressable by a Uniform Resource Identifier (URI)

With the ability to save favorite dashboards and add comments, users can collaborate and easily access dashboards with customized information. All content is displayed in a role-based, secure, customizable, and extensible environment.

SAS Documentation for the Web

Your installation can include the SAS Help Viewer for Midtier Applications. SAS Help Viewer for Midtier Applications enables users to view and navigate SAS online Help in the various SAS Web applications. This component combines the help viewer with the help content for various SAS Web applications and creates an EAR file that can be deployed on a Web application server. Users access the help contents for each application through the help menu that is provided with each SAS Web application.

The SAS Help Viewer for Midtier Applications also provides an administrative interface that is used to view the status of the documentation products. Administrators can use this interface to determine whether the documentation products were installed correctly, or whether there was a configuration problem. The administration interface is available from http://server:port/SASWebDoc.

SAS BI Portlets

The SAS BI Portlets are based on JSR 168 and are available with SAS Enterprise Business Intelligence Server. These portlets are seamlessly integrated into the SAS Information Delivery Portal. SAS BI Portlets enable users to access, view, or work with content items that reside in either the SAS metadata server or the SAS Content Server.