A message from SAS Canada

The SAS Community: The more things change, the more they stay the same

In 1993, I was an Account Executive with Digital Equipment Corp. (DEC), and considering a position with SAS in Ottawa. Nearly every VAX computer I sold had SAS installed on it, and I was intrigued. I asked a colleague (a loyal SAS user) what he thought of the company, and he listed four things that he knew about SAS:
1) The company provides quality products unmatched in capability.
2) SAS is an ethical company that provides solid customer support.
3) SAS treats its employees very well.
4) Among SAS customers and employees alike, there is a strong sense of community.

I joined SAS early the following year.

After opening the Ottawa office, I spent nearly 10 years watching SAS’ product set grow from core analytics to data warehousing and data mining, from business intelligence to financial management and marketing automation solutions. Although the products and solutions changed and grew along with our customers’ needs, the one thing that remained the same was the strong affinity customers and employees had for this company. That sense of community remained unchanged.

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Key Happenings

Better Forecasting Promotes Company Growth

TD Meloche Monnex Group is the largest direct-response home and auto insurer and one of the top three home and auto insurers in Canada. The Group is also the national leader in group insurance and the reference point in affinity marketing.

As the ability to stay ahead of the industry depends on how information is used, the need to set up a system for comparative analyses and share the findings becomes a major issue. Therefore, TD Meloche Monnex Group turns to SAS for assistance in analyzing marketing campaigns. Using SAS Business Intelligence, marketing information can now be collected and analyzed. These results will help refine the marketing approaches to reach the goals of growth in clientele, policy sales and premiums.

“SAS seems to be the logic solution since SAS software allows us to collect large amounts of data faster” explains Sylvain Leroux, Manager, Forecasting and Business Intelligence at TD Meloche Monnex Group. As our data collection is currently handled manually, reports are created by the research team and published in-house. Leroux adds: “With SAS, we are saving a lot of time. SAS allows us to eliminate all the Excel reports by sharing the information directly via our in-house Web site with viewable reports for the entire corporate group. It also provides management with scorecard and dashboard view options.

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User Group Subscriptions and Schedule

If you'd like to receive information about user groups in your area, please subscribe to our email list.  Once this list has been updated, we will only send emails to those that have registered online.  This is a great way to change any of your details as well so that our database is current.

Regional User Group Schedule:

Please check our Canadian User Group Web page regularly for updates: www.sas.com/canada/usergroups

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SAS Users @ Work

Peter Eberhardt Consultant Fernwood Consulting

I stared using SAS around 1980. I had just changed jobs and was trying to entice a former client to follow me. We had been doing survey analysis with SPSS, and when I saw the new company did not use SPSS but had something called SAS, I was a little discouraged. Then I saw SAS/GRAPH, did up some graphics mocking the survey results, and I had my first client at the new company.

Over the years, I worked mostly on the mainframe and, like many, had a limited exposure to the breadth of the SAS offering. That changed in 1998 when I first attended SUGI – I was amazed by how much there was to SAS and what a small part of it  I knew.  Since then, I’ve been both a regular attendee and contributor at SUGI and now SAS Global Forum, as well as the regional user groups NESUG and SESUG.  Now I work primarily with the SAS Business Intelligence suite of tools and am loving it.

To learn more about Peter, including his Techie Tip click here.

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Education Tips and Tricks

James Waite Training Specialist SAS Canada

James joined SAS as a Technical Training Specialist in November 2005, using his extensive coding background to quickly pick up programming in Base SAS 9.1.

With seven years of experience in business intelligence software, James’ focus within SAS Education is on the various data integration and BI server applications, including SAS Data Integration Studio, SAS OLAP Cube Studio, SAS Information Map Studio, SAS Web Report Studio, SAS Stored Processes, SAS Add-In for Microsoft Office and SAS Information Delivery Portal.

Additionally, James has created several short learning modules on XML, OLAP and SAS Add-In for Microsoft Office. He is currently authoring a thought leadership course to provide a deeper general understanding of business intelligence.

For more on James and his techie tip click here.

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SAS Consulting @ Work

Henning Dekant TechnicalConsultant SAS Canada

Having started out as consultant in the SAS headquarters in beautiful Heidelberg, Germany, seven years ago, I was drawn to the new business solutions that SAS was introducing into the market. As a result, I eventually took on the role of technical product manager for our marketing automation and strategic performance management solutions in Germany. Helping successfully establish these products has been a satisfying experience. Family drew me to North America in November 2003, and I took a position as a consultant at SAS world headquarters in Cary, NC.
Since we love winter sports, my wife and I decided that North Carolina was not the best place for us to be, and we moved on to SAS Canada, where I now work as a technical consultant out of the Toronto office.

For more on Henning, including his "Techie Tip", click here.

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User Groups @ Work

Toronto Data Mining User Group

As an essential part of every business, data mining is used for a variety of tasks, from finding trends and developing models to predict sales or losses, to helping determine medication needs based on a patient’s symptoms. The Toronto Data Mining User Group is unique in its exclusive focus on data mining. 

This group, organized last year, holds two forums per year. The three forums sponsored so far have attracted an average of 90 members from a wide range of industries, companies, and technical levels.

Forums combine short and long presentations. Half of the presentations focus on specific technical methods, while the other half offer more general information designed to help data miners excel in their fields. A favorite part of every forum is the discussion panel, where all users get a chance to ask questions of the presenters, who are experts in their fields.

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Academic News

Using SAS to Solve Sudoku Puzzles
Professor Machiel Kruger from the North-West University Centre for Business Mathematics and Informatics, South Africa - the 2005 SAS Academic Intelligence Award Winner - developed a Sudoku puzzle-solver using SAS.

Professor Kruger has formulated the puzzle as a mathematical optimization problem. The mathematics can be found here.

In order to overcome the mathematical optimization problem Kruger created a SAS program that uses PROC IML and PROC LP to solve the problem. To view the SAS code click here.

We would like to highlight the new release of Experimental Procedures in SAS/OR Software:

The experimental OPTLP procedure (SAS/OR 9.1.3, Release 2) can also be used to solve linear programs. PROC OPTLP requires a linear program to be specified using a SAS data set that adheres to the MPS format, a widely accepted format in the optimization community.

You can also use the experimental PROC OPTMODEL modeling language to solve linear programs. The OPTMODEL syntax enables you to express the problem in a form that resembles the symbolic form.

Within both OPTLP and OPTMODEL you have access to three LP solvers: primal simplex, dual simplex, and the iterative interior point solver.

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SAS®9 Corner

by Fulton Lee
With the heavy reliance on metadata in the SAS®9 platform, certain administrative tasks should be performed periodically to ensure a smooth and dependable SAS environment:

Back up and restore metadata server repositories.

Simply having a system backup is not enough.It’s important to pause or stop the metadata for any backup utility to properly back up the repository.This step is required to flush the memory of any changes and write them to file. For more details on metada backups click here.

Clear out log files to clear disk space.

It is a good practice to check the logs of the SAS environment to ensure that all systems are operating correctly. This table lists the default locations for log files.

Stay tuned for further tips and tricks to maintain your SAS®9 environment.

Customer Value Award

Customer Value Award

The Customer Value Award honours and rewards an individual for their ongoing support in his/her local SAS community. Examples include: people who informally assist their peers, user group involvement, anyone who goes beyond the call of duty to assist SAS usage.

The recipient of the award will receive a trip to SAS Global Forum and a plaque to be presented at a special dinner at the conference.

Nominations must be submitted by November 30th, 2006.

For more information on how to nominate someone please visit our Customer Value page.

Book Review

Title: Categorical Data Analysis Using the SAS System, Second Edition
Author:  Maura Stokes, Charles Davis, and Gary Koch
Reviewed by: Jian Liu
Reviewer's Opinion:
“If you want to be an expert on categorical data analysis, then this book is for you. The book begins with analyzing the smallest units within an experimental design and then provides excellent practical advice – from model selection to interpretation of results. For people with some statistical training but only a little SAS experience, this book would be very helpful; it takes you step-by-step through the theory, with each chapter adding a logical next layer of complexity. Every example is complete with SAS code, output and thorough discussion of the research questions, conclusions and interpretations. A great reference in categorical data analysis.”

For more on this book click here

Did You Know?

The Toronto Area SAS Society celebrated its 20th anniversary this summer. Carl Clutton, former president of TASS, received an award from Carl Farrell, president of SAS Canada at the meeting in recognition of his 20 years of leadership and dedication to TASS.

Education News

All 2006 courses are online!

A variety of courses have been added across Canada with something for everyone. You can print off a copy of the training catalogue or send us a request to get one in the mail.

New SAS BI Course for Administrators

Attention all administrators! Want an overview of the new functionalities and applications of SAS® 9? SAS Enterprise Intelligence Architecture Overview is the first step. This half-day Live Web course will give you a high level understanding of the architecture in your environment. Register today!

Use EPTO to register for M2006

The ninth annual M2006 data mining conference will be held in Las Vegas, October 23-24. In addition to the 2-day conference, M2006 offers the latest technical training in the industry. Use your Canadian EPTO to register for both the conference and/or the training.

Register now!

Upcoming Events

Inside SAS Web Series
This exclusive Web series takes you backstage as SAS experts discuss current products and hot topics in depth. A special segment previews cutting-edge technology and the latest SAS news.

Business Value Series

The Business Value Series is a set of interactive seminars with a theme of "Actionable Analytics" hosted by SAS and delivered by leading industry experts.

• An Analytic Mindset - Leveraging Analytics for Business Success
• Divide & Conquer – Realizing ROI Through Customer Segmentation
• Continuous Learning – Using Measurement to Drive Business Value

For more information or to Register, click here

SAS In The News

Congratulations to Bill Fehlner on his retirement from SAS
by Stephen Keelan

Bill has always been a leader at SAS, and even in retiring, he is on the cutting edge, as he is the first employee to retire from SAS Canada. To describe Bill’s many contributions to SAS, to each of his colleagues and to each of you, our customers, whom he has taught and helped during his career would be very difficult in just one communication. And it would never really do him justice, I’m sure.

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