F un with SAS

By Chandra Prakash
 Preface

I had an encounter with SAS long back during my MBA days but I never appreciated

neither I found something exciting about it. It was just; seems another software. I knew
there are lots of demands in the market for this software and it cost a sky high price. But I
S AS is the leader in business

never could digest the logic. analytics software and services,

and the largest independent
After MBA I joined a BIG4 Audit firm as a data analytics professional and among many vendor in the business
other softwares I had to work on SAS as well. But I always preferred ACL, an alternate intelligence market.
analytics tool. ACL is very much appreciated software in Auditing space. The very
reason for this popularity is being customized to audit needs. Though Excel become In addition, SAS has many
much handy to handle smaller set of data and in most cases what audit need. In few of business solutions that enable
large-scale software solutions for
the instances where audit procedure need to handle much bigger data, ACL come into
areas such as IT management,
use and while SAS is the only option in abnormally bigger data.
human resource management,
financial management, business
So Finally I concluded with limited scope of SAS Usage in audit that the much
intelligence, customer
appreciated software has no better use.
relationship management and
more
I continued using ACL until I met with requirement to use statistical technique for
analytical review. There was another in-house developed VBA based program that was
used through the ages in the firm which utilizes regression technique for these purposes. I
thought of using ACL for such a requirement and realized that it is just incapable. I
searched into many other software and found less know SPSS to audit has a good
capability of performing statistical procedures, although, it had its own limitations. We
could not do more than what has been provided in the tool. So it was not an end of
search. After much revolving around I understood why SAS keeps its place.

This book do not intend to any purpose. I am trying to include SAS procedure which I
liked and can provide additional capabilities.
 GMAP

So GMAP is a SAS procedure that can produce this kind of chart. I don’t think I

know any other software with such a capability.

So let‘s play with GMAP.

 Type of Maps

GMAP Procedure is capable of producing four different kinds of MAPs.

Ø two-dimensional maps
· Choropleth maps

Ø three-dimensional maps
· Block maps
· Prism maps
· Surface maps

There are two major constituents of these graphs.

v Map data sets ( Define the map)

v Response data sets (Overlay responses)

This is very import that both the data sets contain the same ID variable;
alternatively, can use a single data set as input if it contains either the map data
or a variable that references a map data set.

There are two types of map datasets, traditional map data sets and feature
tables. The traditional map datasets should contain at least two numeric
variable representing coordinates in two dimensional surface to define the
various areas in the map or latitude-longitude if projected and another uniquely
identifiable variable (numeric or character) representing the areas in the map,
used in ID statement in SAS code. The traditional map can also contain another
variable called SEGMENT. A unit area is defined by observations in the map
data set that have the same identification (ID) variable value. A unit area might
be composed of a single polygon or a collection of polygons.
 Mapsonline

A polygon is defined by all of the observations that have the same SEGMENT
variable value within the same unit area.

In contrast to the traditional map data set which stores the spatial information
across multiple observations, the feature table uses a data arrangement to store
a reference to the spatial information in a single variable value.

Response data set contains the information that need to be overlaid at the
map. They are generally made up of Reponses and identification (ID) Variable.

SAS/GRAPH software includes a number of predefined map data sets. If you

don’t have the required map you wish to use, never mind SAS provide excellent
support. You can get them on
http://www.sas.com/mapsonline

Right now I am downloading map

data set for INDIA. These datasets
are accessible free of cost however
you need to register before
downloading them.

After downloading and unzipping

the Map dataset it needs to be
submitted to SAS using CIMPORT
procedure.
 CIMPORT

Using CIMPORT is pretty simple. There are only two piece of information that is
required to pass. First is where the sas data set will be stored (Name of the
liberary) and what is the location of .cpt file.

libname INDIA 'C:\.......\fun with sas';

proc cimport infile= ‘C:\.......\India\india.cpt' library=INDIA;
run;

Code ran successfully and created two data set named india.sas7bdat &
india2.sas7bdat.

Below is the general form of PROC

GMAP statement. It need Map
data set and response dataset or
in case of feature table where
response dataset is merged with
map information need not
require separate map dataset. In
that case <MAP=map-data-set>
can be ignored.

ANNOTATE data sets Helps to label the locations in maps it contains the label
information as well as geographical coordinates of the locations to identify the
area.
 Generic Code
PROC GMAP <MAP=map-data-set>
DATA=response-data-set | feature-table
<ALL>
<ANNOTATE=Annotate-data-set>
<DENSITY=0...6 | LOW | MEDIUM | HIGH>
<GOUT=<libref.>output-catalog>
<IMAGEMAP=output-data-set>
<STRETCH>
<UNIFORM>;
ID id-variable(s) | geo-variable;
AREA response-variable </ option(s)>;
BLOCK response-variable(s) </ option(s)>;
CHORO response-variable(s) </ option(s)>;
PRISM response-variable(s)</ option(s)>;
SURFACE response-variable(s) </ option(s)>;

If response dataset do not contain observations for all the ma areas they would
be ignored from the map; using “ALL“would specify to include the map area
even when they do not have their respective observations. “DENSITY” relates to
resolution of the map. GOUT directs the location of the output catalogue which
can be viewed later using GREPLAY procedure.
This book is not complete. Keep watching this space for
updation/ revision.

This book is written with non monetary purpose. Print, transfer,

Copy, download, upload…. Anything you wish; please feel
free. If you have any comment/ suggestion/
critic/grievances/query/request, do write me at
chandra5911@gmail.com.