Tag: Best Practices

Career: Secrets from a Professional SAS Recruiter

Recently I spoke with Dick Smith, Talent Engagement Manager for PiTech Solutions, about some tips for working with recruiters. He’s an experienced technical recruiter so I think you’ll find this information particularly insightful. He offers a good mix of traditional job search strategies and ways to leverage social media for your job search. Working with SAS Recruiters As for working with SAS or specialty recruiters, the technology world is most times defined by skill sets or product expertise. In SAS for example, there is a big difference between a SAS/Stat Programmer and a SAS BI/Analytics skill set. For my money, the KISS method applies in either case. So to begin with, keep your resume simple and straightforward. Tell the reader what you can do, what your best expertise is, and what you are looking to do with your career next. Our screening process here at PITech Solutions, for instance, has a focus on the individual. Of greatest importance to us is to clearly understand what kind of position you are really looking for, or put another way – what is the ideal job for you? What do you see as your strongest expertise in the IT field at this point in your […]

SAS Web Report Studio: Chart Makeover – Before and After Shots!

SAS Web Report Studio has some features that help can improve the overall appearance or just shake things up a little. You can change the template for individual reports in cases where you need to better highlight an idea. Tip! Check out the Information is Beautiful site for some inspirational ideas about presenting data. Of course, Stephen Few’s Now Your See It book I keep on my desk as a reference for presenting data. Changing the SAS Web Report Studio Template Colors In the Before shot, the Applied filters text is black, which I think is a little distracting, and the green line disappears slightly into the blue bar. In the After chart, the line is red so there is more contrast between the line and bar. Note: This change will update the template and change the color from green to red everywhere. Make sure that is what you want to do. To change the chart, do this: From the File menu, select Properties. From the Format pane, select the Use customized colors radio button. Select the second color box on the top row, which controls the line color. From the color drop-down box, select a new color. Bonus Ideas […]

Best Practices: Letting SAS Enterprise Guide Write MDX Code

SAS Enterprise Guide is a VERY useful client tool for SAS development and data analysis.  One the best features is the ability to see the SAS code generated from different tasks.  In addition to viewing the Base SAS code used to perform different tasks, you can also view MDX code written to create certain measures, members, and sets in OLAP Cubes. Adding Simple Measures from SAS Enterprise Guide Let’s start by creating a simple measure for a Rolling 3 Months of Sales using my SGF2011 cube: Create a time series measure: Enter the parameters: Specify the format: The next screen summarizes the parameters entered into this wizard. You can see the MDX written here as well.  Click ‘Finish’ to define the measure. You should see the measure in your cube output.  Right click anywhere on the grid output to ‘Edit View’ > ‘Edit with MDX Editor’. This is the output you should see in the MDX Editor: The measure can then be defined in the cube globally by putting the MDX code in the SAS program which builds the cube (if applicable) or through SAS OLAP Cube Studio.  This same method can be used to view the MDX code generated […]

Career: New Year’s Resolution – Get a New Job

LinkedIn for SAS Professionals – Part 1 Linked In is fast becoming a great place for SAS recruiters and SAS candidates to meet. If you are looking for a job, here are some tips to spiff up your Linked In profile to get the SAS programming job of your…

SAS Prompts: When do you use a Variable Prompt?

If you have spent anytime building SAS  prompts for a stored process, then you might have noticed the prompts near the bottom of the list and wondered how anyone would use those or even need them. In a previous post, I showed you how to use the data l…

10 tips for organizing your SAS Enterprise Guide projects

What is the best way to organize your SAS work in a SAS Enterprise Guide project?  There are no project templates or enforced structure, really, but isn’t there a best practice? I don’t have a single prescription for the best project organization.  I believe that it depends on the nature […]