What can we do with proc report that we cannot do with proc print?
They seem very similar in usage. It seems that they are both used to create a list style report
PROC Report is a more advanced feature as compared to PROC PRINT , which gives a listing kind of report. I don't say that print procedure is bad, as we used to use it before in a different fashion. The additional features of PROC REPORT stand out against PRINT procedure,
Ability to compute a variable and display it in the final report on the fly - using COMPUTE block
No pre-sorting required, you can do that using define <> /
Ability to add free style text and proper breaks for TOTALS - you can control this properly in report where as you have less control in PROC PRINT.
There are many others, but the above few I found a lot useful and differentiating as per me, others can add more though.
Related
I have a problem with the legend not being visible at cross tabulation in porc freq in SAS. How can I show it?
I see only a table:
But I want to also see a legend:
PROC FREQ does not have a legend per se, but you can use the title statement to put some information there, or footer.
If you want better control, use PROC TABULATE which has substantial ability to customize the output, including the box option which places whatever information you want in the top-left corner of the table.
If you run the following:
proc template;
source Base.Freq.CrossTabFreqs;
run;
Then check your log, you should see:
define crosstabs Base.Freq.CrossTabFreqs;
notes "Crosstabulation table";
cellvalue Frequency Expected Deviation CellChiSquare TotalPercent Percent RowPercent ColPercent CumColPercent;
header TableOf ControllingFor;
footer NoObs Missing;
If you do not, that means that someone has modified your PROC FREQ base template and that's why it's not showing. In this case you would need to replace your default SAS installation templates by obtaining clean copies from a different source. It may also need to align with your SAS version.
If you have a colleague or different SAS installation that is operating as expected, you can run the PROC TEMPLATE above, then copy the code from the log and re-create the template as:
proc template;
<insert copied code from log>;
run;
And you probably realize, but this is why modifying templates is generally a last resort for customizing data/output and usually you should never modify the default templates.
When using R markdown for making statistical reports, I have the ability to echo the R code in my output document. I'm learning SAS and I was wondering if it was possible to highlight or echo the SAS code in my final ODS report ? I'm using a dirty hack right know to display the code in my document, which is using "ods text = ", but it seems quite redundant. Plus it doesn't add syntax highlighting.
That feature does not exist in the SAS language right now, but it has been mentioned in several talks by Amy Peters, principal product manager of the SAS programing environments, as a planned feature for a near-future SAS release (with no specific date yet, but hopefully in the next 2 years). It would likely be implemented in a similar fashion to Jupyter Notebooks, in that you write your code and get your output inline.
That said, SAS does support Jupyter Notebooks, which is the best current (third party) solution. Contact your SAS administrator for more information.
I have an idea here, I'm the type of guy who dosent take no for answer and find a way to fiddle and get it done... but i think this is abit far fetch... you can try still I think it will work with mostly evrything but may have a hard time to play with quotes when you have multiple semi colomns....
Check:
I started by creating a dumbass dataset :
data tata;
x=1;
run;
then we do the following:
%let code= select * from tata;
proc sql;
create table report as
&code.;
quit;
proc print data=report;
footnote "&code.";
run;
The rationale:
I think it you put your code in macrovariables and then execute those macro variables you would be able to print show the code after by printing the macrovariable following your text...
See the sample
SAS has several forms it uses to create output data sets from within a procedure. It is not always clear whether or not a particular procedure can generate a data set and, if it seems to be able to, it's not always clear how.
Off the top of my head, here are some examples of how widely the syntax can differ.
Example 1
proc sort data = sashelp.baseball out = baseball_sorted;
by
league
division
;
run;
Example 2
proc means noprint data = baseball_sorted;
by
league
division
;
var nHits;
output
out = baseball_avg_hits (drop = _TYPE_ _FREQ_)
mean = mean_hits
;
run;
Example 3
ods exclude all;
ods output
statistics = baseball_statistics
equality = baseball_ftest
;
proc ttest data = baseball_sorted;
class league;
var nHits;
run;
ods exclude none;
Example 4
The PROC ANOVA OUTSTAT= option.
It seems almost as if SAS has implemented each of these willy-nilly. Is the SAS syntax dictating how to create a data set directed by some consistent approach I am not seeing or is it truly capricious and arbitrary?
For PROC code, the syntax for outputting data is often specific to that procedure, which often feels willy-nilly. (Your examples 1, 2, 4) I think PROC developers are given a lot of freedom, and remember that many of these PROCS are 30+ years old.
The great thing about the Output Delivery System (ODS, your example 3) is it provides a single syntax for outputting data, regardless of the procedure. So you can use the ODS OUTPUT statement with (almost?) any PROC. The names and structures of the output objects will of course vary between PROCs. So if you are looking for a consistent approach, I would focus on using ODS OUTPUT. ODS was added in V7 (I think).
It would be interesting to try to find an example of an output dataset which could be made by a PROC but could not be made by ODS OUTPUT. I hope there aren't any. If that is the case, you could consider the range of OUTPUT statements/options within PROCs as legacy code.
Agree with Quentin. You have to remember that there are SAS systems out there running code written in the 80s. SAS would have a huge headache if they forced every team to rewrite all the procedures and then forced their customers to change all their code. SAS has been around since the 60s and the organic growth of the syntax is to be expected.
FWIW, having an OUT= statement makes sense on things with no graphical output. I.E. PROC SORT or PROC TRANSPOSE.
The way I see it there are four main ways to specify the output data sets.
In the PROC statement you may be able to specify some type of output statements or options, such as OUT= OUTEST=.
In the main statement of the procedure, ie MODEL/TABLE can have options that allow for output. ie PROC FREQ has an OUT= on the TABLE statement.
An explicit OUTPUT statement within a procedure. These are typically from older procedures. ie PROC MEANS
ODS tables which are relatively newer method, more frequently used these days since the format aligns with what you'd expect to see.
Yes, there are multiple places to check, but fortunately the SAS documentation for procedures is relatively clear with the options and how to use/specify the outputs.
If I've missed anything that seems different post in the comments and I can update this.
PS. Although SAS is definitely bad, trying to navigate different packages/modules in Python to export an XLSX file isn't straight forward either. Some packages support some options others don't. I've given up on asking why these days and just accept it as peculiarities of the different languages at this point.
Question: is there a way to just get the ODS table names from a PROC without running the program up to that point with ods trace on?
Background: I often need to output an ODS data set from a PROC, but the only method I know of to get the list of available data sets is to insert
ods trace on;
before the PROC, then run the program, then review the log file to find the appropriate data set name, then insert my ods output statement, and re-run.
In a time-consuming program, that process can take a lot of time, and it just seems inefficient to have to run a program in order to figure out how to continue programming.
I can't find any SAS documentation that lists the available ODS tables by PROC, but if something like that exists, that would be a great answer to this question. I know the ODS output tables vary depending on which options are specified, but it still seems like a comprehensive list could be compiled, with notes about whether each table is dependent on PROC-specific options.
I'd also love it if there were something like a meta-PROC where a PROC name could be specified, and the ODS table names are returned, without running any other code.
There is a compilation in the SAS doc. This is for 9.4, but there is one in all the versions.
http://support.sas.com/documentation/cdl/en/odsug/66611/HTML/default/viewer.htm#p0mnbijm0t6w1cn1dpf3q5suxk4u.htm
You can run it with options obs=1; (just reset to obs=max later) if the output procedure is capable of running with zero observations (in general, if you're not doing any programmatic code generation, this is probably the case). You can also likely create a test procedure run that does not use your actual data (although that depends on what you're doing). (You cannot use obs=0, as that would produce no output.)
For example:
options obs=1;
ods trace on;
proc freq data=sashelp.class;
run;
ods trace off;
options obs=max;
You also may be able to determine the names from the installed templates, if it is a procedure that uses templates. For example, PROC FREQ does.
Bring up the Results explorer, and right click on the "Results" node up at the top. Select "Templates". That opens the Template explorer. Then look about for your procedure. Most of the statistical procedures are in Sashelp.Tmplstat. FREQ is not, however; it is in Sashelp.Tmplbase, under Base.Freq. Each of the PROC FREQ entries that starts with define table ... is a separate ODS table; the primary ones for PROC FREQ are Onewayfreqs and CrosstabFreqs, but generally all of the ones with a similar icon to those are tables (the blue ones are dynamic variables).
For PROC REG, for example, it is in the SASHELP.tmplstat folder (SASHELP.tmplstat.Reg), and has a few dozen tables available to see, generally with logical names. Not every table is produced from every run (it depends on what you ask for and what the PROC decides is needed), and I'm not sure every single one is available to intercept via ODS, but most of them are.
What exactly is the difference between Proc Means and Proc Summary? Many sites state that both these are the same, but unless each has something unique will SAS create it?
#cmjohns gives the biggest difference...and from SAS discussion forum
"In earlier versions of SAS (SAS 5 and 6) PROC MEANS and PROC SUMMARY were separate procedures. Over time, by version 8, the code for the 2 procedures was standardized and "melded" together. There are essentially no differences except that MEANS creates output in the LISTING window or other open destinations, while SUMMARY creates an output dataset by default." (use the PRINT option in the Proc Summary statement to generate output)
Check the link Here
My understanding is that the PROC SUMMARY code for producing an output data set is exactly the same as the code for producing an output data set with PROC MEANS. The difference between the two procedures is that PROC MEANS produces a report by default, whereas PROC SUMMARY produces an output data set by default. So if you want a report printed to the listing - use proc means - if you want the info passed to a data set for further use - proc summary may be a better choice.
I have come across situations in SAS 9.1.3 where proc means has had "out of memory" problems yet proc summary will still run the equivalent request just fine. Something to keep in mind if you ever run into this problem.
**Proc Means**
->By Default Print the Output.
->By default gives variable name,
label name(if any), mean, no of non-
missing values, std dev, min and max.
->By default take all the numeric
variables in to analysis.
**Proc Summary**
-> By default does not print the output.
-> By default gives only no of non-missing values.
-> If specifying statistics function then have to specify the variable name with Var statement.
proc means : 1) The print option is set by default which displays output .
2) Omitting the var statement analyses all the numeric variable.
Proc Summary : 1) No print option is set by default,which displays no output.
2) Omitting the variable statement produces a simple count of observation.
Proc Means requires at least one numeric variable while proc FREQ has no such limitations.