software docs sas enterprise guide

8/6/2019 Software Docs SAS Enterprise Guide

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May 2008

Stanford UniversitySocial Science Data and Software

Getting Started with SAS Enterprise Guide

Table of Contents

Overview of the User Interface .................................................................................................. 1

Useful Pull-down Menus ............................................................................................................ 3

Working with Data ..................................................................................................................... 4SAS data files ...........................................................................................................................................................4 Other data files.........................................................................................................................................................5

Working with Tasks ................................................................................................................... 5Choosing a Task.......................................................................................................................................................5 Performing a Task....................................................................................................................................................6 Exploring a Typical SAS Task Window .......................................................................................................................7 Example: Creating a Simple Report............................................................................................................................7

Working with Results ................................................................................................................. 8Changing the Result Format and Style........................................................................................................................8

Working with Process Flow ...................................................................................................... 10

For More Information and Assistance ...................................................................................... 12SAS Enterprise Guide Help..................................................................................................................................... 12SAS Enterprise Guide Tutorials............................................................................................................................... 12Books.................................................................................................................................................................... 12SSDS at Stanford................................................................................................................................................... 13

Overview of the User Interface

SAS Enterprise Guide is a Windows client application with an easy-to-use interface. It has a graphicalinterface consisting of pull-down menus, dialog boxes, and windows that display and organize data, and

perform numerical and graphical tasks. You can perform all tasks in SAS Enterprise Guide by pointing

and clicking the mouse. This section describes the basic features of the SAS Enterprise Guide pull-down

menus and windows. SAS Enterprise Guide is a stand-alone application that requires a SAS server,

which can be either a local server or a remote server on any major computer platform. To use SAS

Enterprise Guide with a remote server, SAS Integration Technologies is also required.

A basic familiarity with the Windows operating system is all you need to get started with SAS

Enterprise Guide. You can access SAS Enterprise Guide on a PC from the Start menu, or by double-

clicking on the Enterprise Guide icon (shown below) on the desktop if applicable.

When you start SAS Enterprise Guide, a screen like the one below will appear:


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Getting Started with SAS Enterprise Guide - 2

This area is the workspace, and the Project Designer is the only window that is open in the workspace.New windows open in the workspace when you generate reports or open data. When there is more than

one window open in the workspace, you can use the tabs at the top of windows to navigate between

them.

The Project Explorer window displays a hierarchical view of the active project. When you create a new

project, the Project Explorer window is empty. As you add data, run tasks, and generate results, an icon

for each object is added to the Project Explorer window.

The Project Designer window is a container for one or more process flows for the project. A process

flow is a relational view of the objects in the project. As you add data, run tasks, and generate results, an

icon for each object is added to the process flow and any relationship between the objects is shown withan arrow.

You can create new process flows and you can copy or move objects between process flows. You can

also run a portion of the process flow or the entire process flow.

The Task Status window displays messages about the status of tasks as they are processing.


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The Task List is hidden by default, but you can display it by clicking or moving your mouse pointer

over the Task List button. Task List allows you to perform various kinds of tasks (e.g. statistical

analysis, graphs, etc.) by a simple click.

Comprehensive help is available from the Help menu. By using the tabs in the Help window, you can

browse the contents or index, perform a search, or bookmark pages for future reference.

Useful Pull-down MenusLike most Windows programs, SAS Enterprise Guide has a toolbar and menu bar with pull-down menus

that you can use to access many of the features of the program. The toolbar contains buttons for more

commonly used procedures. To see what each button does, hold the mouse over the button for a moment

and a description of what the button does will appear. The following is a summary of the main pull-

down menus and their functions:

Menu Functions

File

Open and save project, data, code, report, and process flow.

Import and export data. Print process flow.

EditModify or copy text, search and replace data. Expand or collapse

data.

View

Customize the look of the SAS Enterprise Guide window by

selecting to view the tool bars, project designer, project flow,

task list, task status, and what is window.

Code Edit and run SAS codes and macros.

Data

Edit data, add or delete rows and columns. Transpose and sort

data. Append and split data. Generate a random sample from the

data.

Describe

List data. Generate summarize statistics of the data. Distribution

analysis. One-way frequencies. Wizards for summary statistics

available.

Graph

Create charts and graphs such as scatterplots, bar charts, line

graphs, and pie charts, donut charts, and box plot. Wizard for bar

charts, pie charts, and line plot available.

AnalyzePerform statistical procedures to produce descriptive and

inferential statistics.

Add-in The Addin Manager menu enables you to add and remove add-intasks.

ToolsCombine multiple reports into one. Set style of report. Schedule

and order tasks.

Window Bring a different window to the foreground.

HelpGet help on SAS Enterprise Guide procedures. Getting Started

tutorial. Connect to the online SAS Enterprise Guide resources.


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Working with Data

Before you can do anything in SAS Enterprise Guide, you need to add the data that you want to analyze

to your project. In addition to SAS data files, SAS Enterprise Guide can read most PC data files such as

HTML, Microsoft Access, dBASE, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Exchange, IBM Lotus 1-2-3, and

Paradox files. You can open data that is located on your own computer or on SAS server that you are

authorized to access.

SAS data files

Data on a server can either be opened from the Libraries or Files folder. SAS libraries are pointers to

locations that store SAS data sets. The Files folder enables you to browse the directory structure of the

server and open any data file that SAS Enterprise Guide can read.

If you choose to look for data on your local computer, you can browse the file structure of your

computer. There is a large collection of sample data that is installed with SAS Enterprise Guide in the

Sample directory.

Here is an example to open a SAS data set on the local computer:

From the File menu, select Open Data. Select Local Computer, find the folder where the data islocated, and double-click the data.

When you open data, it opens in a data grid that is located in the workspace area. The tab at the top of

the data grid shows the data filename. At the same time, a shortcut to the data is automatically added to

the current project and the data opens in a data grid. By default, the data opens in read-only mode. In the

Process Flow window there are shortcuts to a SAS data set.


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Other data files

If you select an Excel file to open, you must decide if you want to open the file as it is or if you want to

import the data to create a SAS data set. If you choose to create a SAS data set from the data, the Import

Data task opens automatically.

If you have data in a text file that you want to use in a task, you must import the data or create a SASdata set first. You can open the Import Data task from the File menu.

After having added data to your project, you can explore the data by viewing it in the data grid. You can

also view the properties of data by right-clicking the data object in the Project Explorer or Process

Flow window and selecting Properties from the pop-up menu. The Columns page of the Properties

window lists all the columns, or variables, in the data as well as the properties of each column.

You can also set options for your task results by going to Tools, select Options and make changes in the

pop-up menu. There are options you can set that affect the way that data is opened and displayed in SAS

enterprise guide.

SAS reads the data in each column as either character data or numeric data. Numeric data is grouped

into four different types of data depending on how it is displayed. These icons appear in the column

headings of the data grid.

In addition to opening existing data and using it, you can also work with your data in the following

ways:

use the Import Data wizard to create SAS data sets from raw data files and Excel files

use the New Data wizard to create a new SAS data file

use the Query Builder to manipulate your data (for example, filter, join, add columns, and sort)

make changes directly to data in the Data Grid

Working with Tasks

Choosing a Task

After you have data in your project, you generally want to work with it in some way. In SAS Enterprise

Guide, you use tasks to do everything from manipulating data, to running specific analytical procedures,

to creating reports.To help you decide which task to use, descriptions and business examples for each SAS task are

available in the What is window. You can open this window by selecting View > What is. As you

move your mouse pointer over a task in the Task List, a description of that task appears in the What is

window. The image below shows a description for the Summary Tables task in the What is window.

After you have opened a task window, you can view help for the entire task by pressing F1 to open the

help window for that task. In addition, you can view a short description of each option that you can

select in a task by moving your mouse pointer over the option and reading the description in the help

pane at the bottom of the task window.


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Performing a Task

One way to select tasks is by using the Task List. The Task List is hidden by default, but you can

display it by clicking or moving your mouse pointer over the Task List button.

If a task has a wizard version and you want to use it, you can clickUse Wizard.

As you scroll down in the Task List, you see tasks in the Graph category. As you scroll down further,

you see tasks for Statistical Analysis.

The Task by Name tab lists individual tasks alphabetically. This tab also lists the SAS procedure or

procedures that are used in the task.

The same tasks that you can select from the Task List are also available from the Data, Describe,

Graph, and Analyze menus. Tasks on the Analyze menu are grouped by type of statistical analysis.

In each task window, there are certain steps that you must complete before you can run the task. For

example, you must specify which variables you want to analyze and how you want to analyze them.After that, you can select from a variety of options that pertain to the particular task. The most common

options for each task are selected for you, so after you've specified the information that is necessary to

run the task, the Run button becomes available and you can run the task and get the default results.


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Exploring a Typical SAS Task Window

All tasks have a Task Roles page where you assign variable to roles in the task. This is how you tell

SAS enterprise guide how you want to analyze your data. The Task Roles list displays all the ways that

variable can be used in the task.

The Variables to Assign list displays all the variable from the data that you have selected.

Note: The data icon next to each variable shows the variables type, and the icon next to each task roleshow the type of variable that the role will accept.

To assign a variable to a task role, you select the variable and drag it to the role. You can also select the

variable, click the right arrow, and select the role from the menu. Most tasks enable you to set a title and

footnote for the task.

Note: As you assign variables to roles and select options, SAS Enterprise Guide generates code that it

will send to SAS to process. You can see this code by clicking the Preview code button in the lower-

left of each task window.

Example: Creating a Simple Report

The most basic report that you can create is a List Report. This type of report has one line for each row

(or observation) in your data. You can select the columns that you want in your report, group the data,

and add totals and subtotals. The task that creates this report is the List Data task.

In the Project Explorer window, select the data set. Then in the Describe menu, select List Data.

Select variables of interest, by pressing CTRL and clicking them, and drag them to the List Variables

category on the right, or click the right arrow and select List variables. After that, assign the grouping


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variable (if applicable) by dragging it to the Group analysis by role, and the Identifying label role.

You can now set Options if needed and clickRun. When the report is displayed, clickMaximize

Workspace so that you can see all the columns in the report. The following graph is an example of List

variable reports.

Working with Results

Changing the Result Format and Style

The default report format of SAS Enterprise Guide is HTML report that uses a default style. To create

an HTML report in a different style or to create a report in a different format (e.g. PDF), you don't have

to start over to do this. You can do this for all the tasks that you run by using the Options window, or

you can override the defaults that you set in the Options window by changing options in the Properties

window for the specific task.

Suppose you want to change the preferences for the List Data task so that results are generated in PDFas well as HTML format. Then set the default style for HTML results to sasweb.

In the Project Explorer window, clickList Data and select Properties from the pop-up menu. In the

selection pane, select Results. Select the Override the preferences set in Tools -> Options check box.

Click the style drop-down list for HTML. Click once to scroll down, and then select sasweb. Under

Result Formats, select PDF, and clickOK.

Now rerun the List Data task to generate PDF results and HTML results in the new style.


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In the Project Explorer window, clickList Data and select Run List Data from the pop-up menu. In

the message window, clickYes. The PDF results open because they are the list results to be generated.

Now suppose you would like to export the HTML List Data as a step in the project, so each time you run

the project an updated HTML file is exported to a specified location. First, in the Project Explorerwindow, clickHTML - List Data and select Export -> Export HTML - List Data As A Step In

Project from the pop-up menu.

The first page of the Export wizard enables you to select the file that you want to export. ClickNext.

The second page of the Export wizard enables you to specify a location for the exported file. If you

would like to change the name of the file, so clickEdit, and click in the File name box to change the

name. ClickSave. ClickNext.

The third page of the Export wizard enables you to review the selections that you have made. Click

Finish.

The Export task runs and creates the HTML file. You have changed the result format and style, and you

have learned to export an HTML file as a step in a project.


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Working with Process Flow

In practice you will probably have multiple data sets and tasks in one project. Sometimes it is helpful to

create a new process flow and move some of the objects from the default process flow to a separate

process flow. This makes it easy to run a process flow to refresh your results. You can even use Tools in

SAS Enterprise Guide to schedule the task to run automatically.

Here is an example how you can run the same task repeatedly, on different data sets without doing

everything from the beginning. The Project Designer window that is shown below contains two

Process Flow windows. The process flow named Candy Nutritional Report contains the objects that

you want to run repeatedly (e.g. each month) to refresh your results.


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First, you need to create a new process flow for the project and rename it. Click the Project Designer

tab. Click in a blank area of the Process Flow window and select New -> Process Flow from the pop-upmenu. ClickProcess Flow 1 and select Rename from the pop-up menu. Fill in the name box Candy

Nutrition Report and then clickOK.

Then, you need to move the List Data task and associated results from the default process flow to the

new one. Click the Process Flow tab. ClickList Data and select Move List Data to Candy Nutrition

Report. Click the Candy Nutrition Reporttab. Click in a blank area of the Process Flow window

and select Run Candy Nutrition Report from the pop-up menu. Note: You can look at the Task

Status window to see the messages about processing. Also notice the background color around the tasks

that indicates the status. Click anywhere in the window to continue. Now, you have created a process

flow for a particular report so that you can run it to refresh your reports.


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For More Information and Assistance

SAS Enterprise Guide Help

SAS Enterprise Guide has an extensive help system that provides information about using it andunderstanding the results. To access the Help system, go to the Help menu and select an option.

The Explore SAS Enterprise Guide lists a table of contents from which you can link to the topics

listed, the Getting Started Tutorial walks you through the most frequently used features of SAS

Enterprise Guide. You are also only a click away from online resources of SAS enterprise guide. This

resource contains much up-to-date information about this product.

SAS Enterprise Guide Tutorials

For information on SAS Enterprise Guide tutorials and resources, see

http://support.sas.com/documentation/onlinedoc/guide/.

Books

SAS for Dummies, by Stephen McDaniel and Chris Hemedinger

The Little SAS Book for Enterprise Guide 4.1, by Susan Slaughter and Lora Delwiche, SAS

Corporation

Statistics Using SAS Enterprise Guide, by James Davis, SAS Corporation


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SSDS at Stanford

The software consultants at Social Science Data and Software (SSDS) provide technical support for SAS

Enterprise Guide users at Stanford. Users can view documents, access information about our drop-in

hours, and submit questions from our web page at:

http://ssds.stanford.edu/

Copyright2008, by The Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University. Permission granted to copy for non-commercial purposes, provided we receive acknowledgment and a copy of the document in which our material appears. Noright is granted to quote from or use any material in this document for purposes of promoting any product or service.

Software Support, Social Science Data and Software

Document revised: May 7, 2008

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