Peek Inside SAS BI Book: Building Business Intelligence with SAS

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You may be aware by now, our new SAS BI book Building Business Intelligence with SAS:Content Development Examples launched last week on the SAS Press site. That’s right, SAS Press or Amazon will be delighted to bring a copy of this SAS BI book to your door.

When Angela and I set out to write this book, one of the first things we discussed was how new users get access to the SAS BI toolset and have no idea of its astonishing capabilities. This book guides you through each one so you understand it. Intermediate and advanced users will also find this book as a valuable reference. Several times, Angela & I have both found ourselves pulling out the draft copy to reference an advanced technique.

This book fulfills a unique spot in the marketplace; there is no other single book that leads you through each SAS BI component with step-by-step examples along with hundreds of tips and techniques to make you successful! SAS Institute offers over nine SAS BI courses to cover all the topics we have jammed packed into this book. Making this an excellent study guide for those planning to take the SAS BI Content Development Exam.

Your SAS BI Bible Personal Tour

Almost every reviewer said, “Wish I had this book when I first started!” After reviewing the book, several reviewer dubbed it the SAS BI Bible. Since we cannot really go on a book tour, the next best thing is giving you a personal tour of each chapter. Here’s some select screen shots to help you understand the book contents.

Chapter 1: Introducing the SAS BI Clients

The first chapter is as you would expect, providing an overview of the SAS BI clients and explaining how they interact with one another along with some common BI definitions.

Throughout the book many of the examples use SASHELP and SAS EG datasets so you can follow along to re-inforce your understanding. Look for the lighting bolt icons in each chapter, these icons highlight tips that contain essential information!

Chapter 2. Using SAS Enterprise Guide with SAS BI

SAS Enterprise Guide has extended functionality when used with the SAS BI clients. The first part to understanding the relationship is learning how to connect to the metadata. This chapter does not stop there – it introduces all the ways you can integrate the SAS BI clients including stored processes, prompts, and the OLAP viewer with SAS Enterprise Guide.

Chapter 3. Creating and Enhancing Stored Processes

Stored processes have so much power! Even if you do not know how to code in SAS – you will find this chapter makes it as easy as spelling SAS. We show you how to creat your first stored process and then provide advanced pointers for using stored processes with HTML code, multiple prompts, and the other SAS BI clients.

Chapter 4. Comprehensive Guide to the SAS Prompt Framework

Prompts take your stored processes to the next level when used correctly. This chapter describes each of the different prompt types: dynamic, dependant, grouped, and shared. We step you through a few examples to put the punch into your stored processes.

Chapters 5 and 6 – Preparing SAS BI Data Sources

You need OLAP cubes and information maps as data sources. A chapter is dedicated to each topic with examples of how to create your first information map and OLAP cube. In later chapters, you’ll see examples of how the information map and cube are used by content developers.

SAS OLAP Cube Studio Builds Cubes Quickly!

OLAP cubes can be tricky – but they are also the centerpiece of a great BI implementation. OLAP cubes make big data structure nimble and ease to navigate. Learn to design and build your first cube with SAS OLAP Cube Studio and then learn to extend the cube’s functionality.

SAS Information Map Studio

Information maps allow you to transform databases into business data. You can learn to create information maps that have filters and use cascading prompts. From there learn to add filters based on user identity to protect the data and reduce the maintenance nightmare.

Chapter 7. Learn Web Report Studio Tips from the Pros!

Web Report Studio is an amazingly easy interface to use. Just by walking through one example, most users are able to understand and build their own reports within minutes. This chapter explains the extras to help you understand how to create custom sort formats, integrate stored processes with your group breaks, and even smarten up your reports with conditional highlighting.

Chapter 8. Learning to use SAS Add-In for MS Office

Using the SAS data with MS Office opens all kinds of possibilities to users. This chapter explains how to use the SAS Tasks to create graphs and table and how to share the data with the other MS Office applications for one button updating. There are additional tips for filtering the server-side data and using the OLAP viewer!

Chapter 9. SAS BI Dashboard

It may be a challenge to design a dashboard, but only because the SAS BI Dashboard gives you such a broad range of choices and abilities. You can take your dashboard from 0 mph to 60 mph in 2 seconds once you understand how to setup all the cool indicators. This chapter teaches you how to add cascaded prompts, set up alerts, and integrate a stored process if you desire. The US Sales Map in the figure was created with a stored process, how cool is that?

Chapter 10. SAS Information Delivery Portal

Using the portlets, you can add a wide variety of content to the portal pages – everything from Web Report Studio reports, dashboards, and stored processes to external content such as RSS feeds or external Web sites. This chapter describes each portlet, explains how to work with the layouts, and some tips for allowing outside access if necessary.