What are the odds of winning the lottery? This seems like a simple question (and yes, there is a simple answer), but there are a few technical details to work out first… Which lottery? Let’s say the Powerball Lottery. When? The number of balls us…
NOTE: DS2, SQL Within a SET Statement
Earlier this week, I suggested taking a look at DS2 (“the DATA step evolved”) as a learning opportunity for the New Year. I listed the advantages that DS2 offers over the traditional DATA step. One of those was the ability to use SQL within a SET state…
Mathematical squiggles in SAS
John D. Cook shared a picture of “pretty squiggles” on his blog, as well as a prose description of the mathematics behind it. I’m more of a programmer than a mathematician, but I’ve attempted to transcribe his description into a SAS program. I used DATA step to generate the point […]
What Analytic Software are People Discussing?
by Robert A. Muenchen How can we measure the popularity or market share of analytic software? One way is to see what people are discussing. I’m in the process of updating my annual article, The Popularity of Data Analysis Software. Below … Continue reading →
Time to trade in your jalopy macro?
Suppose you have an old jalopy that’s perfectly reliable. Your jalopy gets you where you wanna go: no frills; no drama. Do you trade your old wheels in for a racecar that accelerates like crazy and corners like it’s on rails? Or stick with what’s old…
Dummy coding in SAS
Here is a macro to generate binary features (also called dummy coding) from a nominal variable (also called a categorical variable, such as eye color). The automation saves time and avoids mistakes when there are many possible values to a category or …