Everything is Better with Friends: Using SAS in Python Applications with SASPy and Open-Source Tooling

Materials from online classes offered after the in-person conference Western Users of SAS Software in San Francisco, California, on September 14-16, 2022.

Materials provided:

• Getting Started class on 03MAR2023:

  • Examples and Exercises as an interactive Google Colab Notebook

  • Solutions to all Exercises as an interactive Google Colab Notebook

  • Solutions to all Exercises as a PDF file

  • Slides as a PDF file

• Beyond the Basics class on 10MAR2023:

  • Examples and Exercises as interactive Google Colab Notebooks:

    • Part 1
    • Part 2
    • Part 3
    • Part 4

  • Solutions to all Exercises as interactive Google Colab Notebooks:

    • Part 1
    • Part 2
    • Part 3
    • Part 4

  • Solutions to all Exercises as PDF files:

    • Part 1
    • Part 2
    • Part 3
    • Part 4

  • Slides as a PDF file

Setup Instructions & Prerequisites

Accounts Needed

In order to interact with code examples, accounts for the following two online services will be needed:

• Google

  • We'll be using Google accounts to run code examples in https://colab.research.google.com/
  • If you don't already have a Google Account, you can create one for free at https://accounts.google.com/signup

• SAS OnDemand for Academics (ODA)

  • We'll be accessing ODA accounts from Google Colab, which will require you to know the Region associated with your ODA account. (The Region for an ODA account is typically displayed in the upper-right corner after logging in.)
  • If you don't already have an ODA account, you can create one for free at https://welcome.oda.sas.com/
  • Note: To create an ODA account, you will also need a SAS Profile account. If you don't already have a SAS Profile account, you can create one for free using the "Don't have a SAS Profile?" link on the ODA login page.

To test your setup, please follow the instructions in our Setup Test Colab Notebook. If desired, you can use the File -> Save a Copy in Drive command to save a copy of the results to your Google Drive.

All in-class examples assume the use of Google Colab and ODA, and we will not be able to provide support for any other setup. However, if you're interested in using a local SASPy environment, with Python talking to a commercial SAS installation, you're welcome to follow the setup instructions for the demo application at https://github.com/saspy-bffs/dataset-explorer

Attendee Prerequisites

Our Getting Started class on 03MAR2023 is designed for SAS programmers of all skills, and only assumes familiarity with Base SAS, including DATA steps and PROC steps. Some examples also assume familiarity with the Output Delivery System, PROC SQL, and the SAS Macro Facility. No familiarity with Python or JupyterLab is assumed.

Our Beyond the Basics class on 10MAR2023 is designed for intermediate to advanced SAS programmers, but assumes only basic familiarity with Python syntax and pandas DataFrames. No knowledge of JupyterLab is assumed, and it's not necessary to have taken our Getting Started class beforehand.

For both classes, we recommend a relatively new computer with a broadband internet connection and a modern web browser.

Learning Outcomes

After successfully completing these classes, we will be equipped for the following:

• Using Google Colab for Python script development, including linking to SAS OnDemand for Academics to access the SAS analytical engine

• Using SAS and Python together with SASPy, include understanding the trade-offs of completing common data-science tasks in SAS and Python.

• Rectangularizing complex JSON-formatted data returned by web APIs.

• Building simple Python web applications utilizing SAS analytics.

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License. See the LICENSE file for details.

Authors

• ilankham
• mtslaugh

Disclaimer

This project is in no way affiliated with SAS Institute Inc.