About Shared Variables :: SAS(R) 9.3 ODS Graphics Designer: User's Guide

ODS Graphics Designer enables you to create graphs that use shared variables. Shared variables provide these benefits:

They enable the reuse of a plot that uses one or more common shared variables.
They enable the reuse of different plots in a graph that use one or more common shared variables.

For example, suppose that you have created the following graph:

This example involves a multi-cell graph with three cells that each contain one or more plots. All plots use the same variable: HORSEPOWER. The example is based on SASHELP.CARS data.

This graph is very effective for visualizing the distribution of a measure. After you have created this graph, you might want to reuse it to view the distribution of some other variable in the same or different data set.

For example, you might want to use the example graph to visualize the distribution of the MPG_CITY variable. In graphs that are not created with shared variables, you must change the variable for each cell individually. Because the X axis is shared, during the changes the X axis might briefly display data from both HORSEPOWER and MPG_CITY. However, when graphs are created with shared variables, you can change one or more variables for all plots simultaneously in a single step. Shared variables facilitate the reuse of graphs, and are especially effective in graphs that have multiple plots.