Overview of Versions

What Is a SAS Model Manager Version?

After a project is created, you create a version folder to import your models, score your models, run reports, and monitor the life cycle of these models. A version is often the time-phased container for your SAS Model Manager projects. The time interval for a project cycle is specified when you create the version, and it might represent a calendar year, a retail season, or a fiscal quarter. A SAS Model Manager project can contain multiple versions. A version contains all of the candidate model resources that you need to determine a champion model as well as all champion model resources. For example, you might develop models for a scoring program that determines whether a customer is eligible for a home equity loan. The version folder could be named 2012. The version contains all of the models, scoring tasks, and reports that are used to determine the champion model. After you select the champion model, the subsequent tasks in a milestone are based on the champion model.
To import a model, you must have at least one version in the project.

How a Version Folder Is Organized

The SAS Model Manager version folder contains life cycle information, auxiliary version documents, candidate model files, model comparison reports, resource files, scoring tasks, and model performance reports. A typical version folder for a project might contain the following:
Version Folder in the Project Tree
The SAS Model Manager life cycle template that is associated with a version determines the milestones and tasks that you complete to develop and implement the scoring model.
SAS Model Manager provides the following functionality for a version:
contains presentations, rosters, documentation, schedules, and other digital information that is related to the version that users can easily access.
contains the milestone phases and tasks that your organization uses to monitor the modeling process. A time-phased roadmap, called a life cycle template, specifies the milestone tasks that are required to implement model life cycle activities. Typical milestone phases for the life cycle of a version are Development, Test, Stage, Production, and Retire. SAS Model Manager provides example life cycle templates that you can use as a model to create your own templates. Templates that are provided by SAS Model Manager cannot be modified. SAS Model Manager administrators and advanced users can use the SAS Model Manager Template Editor to customize life cycle templates. You must create a life cycle template for your version before you create the version.
contains the imported candidate models, a champion model after it is selected, and challenger models. Each model contains the files that SAS Model Manager uses to run model reports and scoring tasks.
contains generated reports. Each report contains the report results, the SAS program that created the report, and a SAS log.
contains data files that SAS Model Manager creates and uses to monitor the performance of the champion model. The folder can also contain user-defined formats that the version models require and version resource files that are not in the Documents folder.
contains scoring task definitions and files that are generated when model scoring tasks are completed, such as output data and statistics.
displays model performance monitoring charts when you select the Performance node. The data sets that create the charts are stored in the Resources folder under each version folder.
inputvar.xml
contains a copy of the project input variables. The project inputvar.xml file is copied to the version inputvar.xml file when a model is set as a champion model. If the project input variables are modified after a champion model is selected, SAS Model Manager knows the required input variables for the champion model.
outputvar.xml
contains a copy of the project output variables. The project outputvar.xml file is copied to the version outputvar.xml file when a model is set as a champion model. If the project output variables are modified after a champion model is selected, SAS Model Manager knows the required output variables for the champion model.

Version Folder Tasks

When you right-click the version folder, SAS Model Manager provides the following functionality for a version:
New Workflow
creates a new workflow from a process definition and associates it with the selected version. For more information, see Creating a New Workflow.
Freeze Version
disables or enables modifications of some version models properties and files. When a version is frozen, a check mark appears next to the task. You typically freeze a version after you declare a champion model and set the project default version in preparation for deploying the champion model to a production environment. Freezing a version restricts the activities that you do with the folder. After a version folder is frozen, you cannot import additional models or change the champion model. You can continue to add files to the Documents, Reports, Resources, and Scoring folders. For more information, see Freezing Models.
Publish Models to a SAS Channel
publishes models to defined channels and notifies subscribers of the publication channel when the models are delivered. For more information, see, Publishing Models to a SAS Channel.
Define Aggregate Report
combines multiple reports from the Reports folder to create a single report. For more information, see Aggregated Reports.
Query
searches for model and tasks that are assigned to SAS Model Manager users. For more information, see Query Utility.
View Workflow
enables the user to view the workflow instance that is associated with the selected version. For more information, see Viewing Workflows.
Generate Training Summary Data Set
generates a data set that is used to create the Train Table Summary report. For more information, see Training Summary Data Set Reports.

Version Metadata

When you click on a version folder, the detail view on the right has tabs that categorize the version metadata:
  • The Properties tab shows the general metadata for the version. For more information, see Version Properties.
  • The Input Variables tab shows the input variables and their attributes for the champion model. Metadata appears on this tab only after the champion model has been set.
  • The Output Variables tab shows the output variables and their attributes for the champion model. Metadata appears on this tab only after the champion model has been set.
  • The Workflow Milestones shows the activities from the SAS Model Manager Workflow Console that are associated with milestones. The metadata includes the milestone or task, the status, the date started, the date completed, and the user ID that modified the milestone or task status.
  • The Publish History tab shows the models that have been published to a database, a SAS channel or to the SAS Metadata Repository. The metadata includes the published name, the destination, the method of publishing, the server name, the user ID that published the model, the date the model was published, the model function, whether the model is a champion model or a challenger model, the project name, the version name, the model name, and the model level.
Here are the version metadata tabs:
Version Metadata Tabs