SAS for R Users

A Book for Data Scientists

Ajay Ohri

• Publisher: Wiley
• Year: 2019
• eBook ISBN: 9781119256434
• Edition: 31
• Topic: Computer Science
• Subtopic: Programming in Python
• Index: Computer Science

BRIDGES THE GAP BETWEEN SAS AND R, ALLOWING USERS TRAINED IN ONE LANGUAGE TO EASILY LEARN THE OTHER

SAS and R are widely-used, very different software environments. Prized for its statistical and graphical tools, R is an open-source programming language that is popular with statisticians and data miners who develop statistical software and analyze data. SAS (Statistical Analysis System) is the leading corporate software in analytics thanks to its faster data handling and smaller learning curve. SAS for R Users enables entry-level data scientists to take advantage of the best aspects of both tools by providing a cross-functional framework for users who already know R but may need to work with SAS.

Those with knowledge of both R and SAS are of far greater value to employers, particularly in corporate settings. Using a clear, step-by-step approach, this book presents an analytics workflow that mirrors that of the everyday data scientist. This up-to-date guide is compatible with the latest R packages as well as SAS University Edition. Useful for anyone seeking employment in data science, this book:

• Instructs both practitioners and students fluent in one language seeking to learn the other
• Provides command-by-command translations of R to SAS and SAS to R
• Offers examples and applications in both R and SAS
• Presents step-by-step guidance on workflows, color illustrations, sample code, chapter quizzes, and more
• Includes sections on advanced methods and applications

Designed for professionals, researchers, and students, SAS for R Users is a valuable resource for those with some knowledge of coding and basic statistics who wish to enter the realm of data science and business analytics.

1
About SAS and R

Here is a brief introduction about R and SAS,instructions about installations and a broad high‐level comparison.

1.1 About SAS

SAS used to be called the Statistical Analysis System Software suite developed by the SAS Institute for advanced analytics, business intelligence, data management, and predictive analytics. Developed at North Carolina State University from 1966 until 1976, when the SAS Institute was incorporated. It was then further developed in the 1980s and 1990s with the additional statistical procedures and components. SAS is a language, a software suite and a company created by Anthony James Barr and James Goodnight along with two others. For purposes of this book we will use SAS for SAS computer language.

• SAS also provides a graphical point and click user interface for non‐technical users.

While a graduate student in statistics at North Carolina State University, James Goodnight wrote a computer program for analyzing agricultural data. After a few years, James's application had attracted a diverse and loyal following among its users, and the program's data management and reporting capabilities had expanded beyond James's original intentions.

In 1976, he decided to work at developing and marketing his product on a full‐time basis, and the SAS Institute was founded. Since its beginning, a distinguishing feature of the company has been its attentiveness to users of the software. Today, the SAS Institute is the world's largest privately‐held software company, and Dr. James Goodnight is its CEO. He continues to be actively involved as a developer of SAS System software as well as being one of the most widely respected CEOs in the community.

The SAS System has more than 200 components

• Base SAS – Basic procedures and data management
• SAS/STAT – Statistical analysis
• SAS/GRAPH – Graphics and presentation
• SAS/OR – Operations research
• SAS/ETS – Econometrics and Time Series Analysis
• SAS/IML – Interactive matrix language

The SAS University Edition includes the SAS products Base SAS®, SAS/STAT®, SAS/IML®, SAS/ACCESS® Interface to PC Files, and SAS Studio. SAS has an annual license fee and almost 98% return to SAS every year, voting by their chequebook. All these products are Copyright © SAS Institute Inc., SAS Campus Drive, Cary, North Carolina 27513, USA. (https://decisionstats.com/2009/08/20/the‐top‐decisionstats‐articles‐part‐1‐analytics/and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAS_(software))

1.1.1 Installation

While SAS Software for Enterprises is priced at an annual license, for students, researchers and learners you can choose from the SAS University Edition (a virtual machine) at https://www.sas.com/en_in/software/university‐edition.html or SAS on Demand at https://odamid.oda.sas.com/SASLogon/login (a software as a service running SAS in browser).

To install the SAS University Edition on your Virtual machine you can follow the following steps (I am using VMware Workstation for this):

• Run your Virtual Machine and click on file.
• Open and select SAS University Edition (the extension of the file should be .ova). You can provide a new name and storage path for your new Virtual Machine and then import.
• Now, you need to initially run the virtual machine and use the link provided in the VM to connect to the SAS University Edition in your browser.

1.2 About R

R is a language and environment for statistical computing and graphics. It is a GNU project which is similar to the S language and environment which was developed at Bell Laboratories (formerly AT&T, now Lucent Technologies) by John Chambers and colleagues. R can be considered as a different implementation of S. R was initially written by Robert Gentleman and Ross Ihaka.

1.2.1 The R Enviro...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Table of Contents
• Preface
• Scope
• 1 About SAS and R
• 2 Data Input, Import and Print
• 3 Data Inspection and Cleaning
• 4 Handling Dates, Strings, Numbers
• 5 Numerical Summary and Groupby Analysis
• 6 Frequency Distributions and Cross Tabulations
• 7 Using SQL with SAS and R
• 8 Functions, Loops, Arrays, Macros
• 9 Data Visualization
• 10 Data Output
• 11 Statistics for Data Scientists
• Further Reading
• Index
• End User License Agreement