Maybe my last report from a PhUSE event: Beerse Single Day Event 2017

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Last month I talked about the presentation “The Art of Defensive Programming – Coping with Unseen Data” I was doing at the PhUSE Single Day Event (SDE) in Beerse, Belgium. The event was held yesterday on 28 November 2017 at the Janssen EMEA site, where I’d started my SAS contracting activities 25 years earlier. This was the 6th SDE I’d presented at in Belgium, and the 3rd on this site, so I was fairly familiar with the venue and knew many of the attendees too.

As at recent conference events I included a free draw for a copy of my latest book “SAS Programming and Data Visualization Techniques“. The attendance at the SDE was around 80 and not just coming from Belgium, with 21 of those entered the draw, and the winner was Lieke Gijsbers from OCS Consulting in the Netherlands (see me presenting her with my book in the photo).

You are probably now asking why this will be my last report from a PhUSE event? Over the last year or so I have reviewed the benefits I get from presenting at conferences and how much it costs me to attend them. Consultants spend a lot of time doing Cost-Benefit analyses and PhUSE events seemed to be moving lower down the list. The larger companies can easily afford to send multiple delegates, but a small percentage of their staff, to PhUSE events because of economies of scale. Unfortunately, Holland Numerics is not a large company, so we have to send 100% of our staff (me!). By presenting we get a 33% reduction on the full conference fee, but we lose 100% of our income during the conference and SDE days, and the same is true for every other independent consultant attending PhUSE. Next year I was hoping to combine some of my training courses with PhUSE SDE and PhUSE Connect (the new name for the annual conference!) events, but none had come to fruition.

I am extremely happy with the records I have created as a mere SAS programmer (and not a Statistical Programmer!) during my membership of PhUSE:

  1. I have attended 13 consecutive PhUSE annual conferences since the first was held in Heidelberg in 2005.
  2. I have presented at least 1 paper in every PhUSE annual conference I have attended, including several papers I had brought with me “just in case” to fill in for short-notice withdrawals.
  3. I have presented in 18 SDEs since they started in 2008, including 6 in Belgium, 4 in the UK, 3 in Germany, 2 in Switzerland and Denmark, and 1 in the Netherlands.
  4. Since the PhUSE annual conference was held in Basel in 2009, I have held a beer-tasting evening near to the conference. That is a total of 9 beer-tasting evenings! It started because I wanted to taste the local beers, I preferred to drink beer with friends, and it seemed to work out just fine, because I had no complaints, and I added many new beers to my beer-tasting database. In fact I had to stop Yvonne Moores, the 2011 Brighton conference chair, from putting a note in the daily conference news, and it was still over-subscribed using just word-of-mouth! The largest evening attendance was actually 24 in Budapest, when, unable to find a Hungarian beer establishment, I opted instead for the “Belgian Abbey Restaurant”!
  5. Last, but not least, no-one has enjoyed PhUSE events more than me!

I would like to thank PhUSE for allowing me to present my SAS-related papers at their conferences and SDEs, but I will not be renewing my membership of the PhUSE Society as usual in January.

Are you interested in SAS macros or SAS efficiency? I’ve updated both apps in Google Play and Amazon Appstore

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Are you interested in SAS macros or SAS programming efficiency? I’ve updated my Android apps focusing on both these topics in Google Play and Amazon Appstore.

Poll: How does your company create graphs?

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ODS Graphics has been around since SAS 9.1.3 (in 2006!), and yet it hasn’t yet taken over the SAS graphics world, even though it could create the vast majority of graphs.

With this in mind I thought I’d create a quick poll to see what is currently being used out there in the real world:

How does your company create graphs?

View Results

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If you think your company ought to be using ODS Graphics more, then download our SAS training course list for free.

If you would like to learn about ODS Graphics yourself, even if your company doesn’t want to pay for a training course for you and your colleagues, then you should read “Part III: Data Visualization” (chapters 9-14) in my book “SAS Programming and Data Visualization Techniques: A Power User’s Guide” instead.

Are you going to the PhUSE Belgium SDE (Single Day Event) in Beerse? I’m presenting there!

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The PhUSE Belgium SDE is being held at Janssen Pharmaceutica near Beerse again on Tuesday 28th November 2017, where I’ll be presenting “The Art of Defensive Programming – Coping with Unseen Data” at 1600hr.

I hoping to be able to run a free prize draw there for you to win a copy of my recent book “SAS Programming and Data Visualization Techniques: A Power User’s Guide“. Just drop in a business card or fill out a blank card at the event to get a chance to win a copy.

I’m looking forward to revisiting the site where I worked on my very first SAS contract in 1992, and maybe tasting some interesting Belgian beers too!

Hope to see you there.

Are you going to SAS Global Forum in Denver? I’m presenting there!

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SAS Global Forum is being held in Denver in 2018 from Sunday 8th to Wednesday 11th April, and I’ve been invited to present “The Art of Defensive Programming: Coping with Unseen Data” there.

I’m also hoping to run another prize draw again for you to win a copy of my latest book “SAS Programming and Data Visualization Techniques: A Power User’s Guide“. Just drop in a business card or fill out a blank card at the ODS Graphics stand to get a chance to win a copy.

Note, however, that at SASGF18 you will only be able to read a copy of the book contents at the stand, as during SASGF17 someone took away my well-used sample copy. So, if you still want to browse the sample, then you’ll have to find me among the expected 5,000+ attendees! 🙁

Hope to see you there.

What happened in Edinburgh?

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This year the PhUSE Conference was held at the Edinburgh International Conference Centre, and in Scotland for the first time. This was my 13th PhUSE Conference, and I’d presented papers at all 13, which was more than anyone else! There were 695 attendees and 40 exhibitors at this PhUSE conference, more than at any previous PhUSE conference too!

I presented “Making Graphs Easier to Validate – The Benefits of ODS Graphics” in the Data Visualisation stream on the 1st afternoon, and the room was nearly full, which I found to be true for most of the other papers I attended during the rest of the conference too. It is always good to present to a full room, because you are more likely to get an audience response to what you are trying to explain.

CK Clinical had one of the exhibitors stands and ran a Connect4 knock-out competition over the 3 days, with the champion Kriss Harris winning Afternoon Tea for two at the Ritz (or equivalent), and runner-up Gareth Parry (see photo on right) winning a copy of my latest book “SAS Programming and Data Visualisation Techniques“.

In 2018 the European PhUSE Conference will be held in Frankfurt, the 3rd time in Germany, but in November, rather than the traditional October, because a new US PhUSE Conference will be taking place in Raleigh NC in June.

There is a new SAS Training Course list for 2017Q4

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There is now a new Training Course list for 2017Q4, which can be downloaded from here. The courses available in 2016 and early 2017 are still there, but had added a new course to the list:

  • ½ day Defensive SAS Programming training

I’m also developing some new SAS-related courses, based on the SAS course, which you can accelerate to production status by requesting them:

  • ½ day SAS Data Step training
  • ½ day SAS PROC SQL training
  • ½ day SAS macros training

Your interest in any of these courses will result in them being developed as priority tasks!

Are you going to PhUSE in Edinburgh? I’m presenting there!

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PhUSE is being held in the Edinburgh International Conference Centre (EICC) in Edinburgh this year from Sunday 8th to Wednesday 11th October 2017, and I’ll be presenting “Making Graphs Easier to Validate – The Benefits of ODS Graphics” in the Data Visualization stream on the Monday afternoon at 1500hr.

PhUSE is now a global conference for the pharmaceutical software community, and there will be 600+ attendees in the following streams:
– Analytics & Statistics
– Application Development
– Coding Tips & Tricks
– Data Standards & Governance
– Data Handling
– Data Visualisation
– Industry Starters
– Management
– Professional Development & Training
– Posters
– Regulatory
– Real-world Evidence
– Software Demonstrations
– Standards Implementation
– Trends & Technology
– Hands-on Workshops
– University Day

CK Clinical will be running a competition (I think it will be Connect4), and one of the prizes will be a copy of my recent book “SAS Programming and Data Visualization Techniques: A Power User’s Guide”. Visit Stand 37 in the Exhibitors Area to get a chance to win a copy.

I’m also planning my annual beer-tasting evening on the Tuesday during the conference at a local venue. Unfortunately attendance will be limited to the first 20 attendees to confirm interest with me at the conference itself, so talk to me early if you’d like to attend!

Hope to see you there.

I still don’t believe it, but I won a SAS Award!

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SAS Lifetime Achievement Award
This is a copy of the slide from SAS Forum UK 2017. My thanks go to SAS UK for their permission to reproduce it.

My university degrees were in Chemistry, but when I tried to find my first job there were none in Chemistry, so, as I’d developed an interest in computing, I decided to move into Information Technology instead. I have never really considered my jobs to be work, even to the present day, but more like a paid hobby.

I first encountered SAS software (version 79.5) in 1981 while working as a mainframe systems programmer at the University of London Computer Centre. Not long after that I was the SAS Representative at Prudential Assurance in London installing SAS on their mainframes, and making myself known to SAS UK by asking their Technical Support question after question about a wide range of SAS features.

In September 1992, 25 years ago, I went freelance, formed my own SAS software consultancy, Holland Numerics Limited, and started work on the first of two SAS contracts in Belgium. Since then I have also worked with, and provided training for, SAS-using companies in the UK, Netherlands, Germany, France, Switzerland, Spain and the USA. As a permanent employee I was never allowed to attend conferences, so I’ve made the most of my freelance status to attend at least one conference every year since 1993, and have presented SAS-related papers at many international conferences since 1995 too. My first paper was presented at SeUGI in Stockholm.

I discovered social media in 2005 when I registered on LinkedIn, but my social media activities really took off in 2008 when I joined Squidoo, and then Twitter, to advertise my first SAS-related book, “Saving Time and Money Using SAS” published by SAS Press. Since then I’ve become active on a number of sites answering SAS-related questions and advertising more of my books. The web sites have included LinkedIn Groups, SASProfessionals.Net, sasCommunity.org, Google+ Communities, SAS Customer Support Communities, BeBee, and now WordPress on this site.

Charles Senabulya presenting me with the award. My thanks go to SAS UK for their permission to reproduce it.

So why do I still not believe that I’ve won a SAS award? I was sent an email the previous week asking if I wanted to attend the Awards Dinner at SAS Forum UK, as I’d been nominated for an award, but not that I’d actually won one, or even which award it was. Everyone from SAS UK I’d met from when I arrived at the conference in Birmingham had been very welcoming, but that certainly wasn’t unusual. Even the description of me before my name was finally revealed referred to me presenting on Analytics at conferences didn’t seem to fit either (until someone later explained to me that SAS staff generally include graphics in Analytics!). Even stepping onto the stage to receive my award felt like I was part of an elaborate hoax, but the warmth of Laurie Miles and Charles Senabulya soon removed that thought from my mind, and I felt extremely honoured to be there and receiving the SAS Lifetime Achievement Award from friends I admired.

Back at my seat I sent a message to my wife Angela to tell her about it. She replied: “Does that mean you can retire as they don’t expect you to do anything else”. Remember at the top of this post I called my job a paid hobby. Some people retire so they’ll have more time to spend on their hobbies, but I’m not sure it is possible to retire from a hobby!!

 

 

The SAS Forum UK 2017 Book Draw Winner was … Peter Lowes

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Peter Lowes receiving his book prize at SAS Forum UK 2017
Peter Lowes receiving his book prize at SAS Forum UK 2017

Congratulations to Peter Lowes from BusinessData Partners, who won a copy of my latest book, “SAS Programming and Data Visualization Techniques”. Thank you also to all the SAS Forum UK 2017 attendees who entered the book prize draw, but didn’t win this time. I hope you will try again at another conference where I’ll be holding a book prize draw in the future.

Are you going to SAS Forum UK 2017 in Birmingham? I’m presenting there!

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SAS Forum UK 2017 is being held in the Vox Conference Centre near the Birmingham NEC again this year from Tuesday 26th to Wednesday 27th September 2017, and I’ll be presenting “Making Graphs Easier to Validate – The Benefits of ODS Graphics” at 1130hr in the Tech Tips stream on the Tuesday.

It will not a very big conference (although last year there were 650 attendees spread over the 2 days), as not everyone attends both days, but it will lean heavily towards techie topics again. Those looking to take certification exams will be able to do so during Tuesday, Tuesday also includes streams for “Expert services for: Learning & Academia”, “Expert services for: Consulting & Premium Support”, “Tech Tips” and “Super Demos”, and the Wednesday will include streams for “Customer Stories”, “SAS Presents”, “Technical Insights” and more “Super Demos”. See the SAS Forum UK 2017 web site for more details.

I will be running a prize draw again for you to win a copy of my recent book “SAS Programming and Data Visualization Techniques: A Power User’s Guide”. Just drop in a business card or fill out a blank card at the stand to get a chance to win a copy.

Hope to see you there.

Would you like to see a brand new issue 56 of VIEWS News soon?

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The Winter 2011 issue of VIEWS News was the last issue published back in January 2012, but would you like me to publish a brand new issue 56 soon?

Currently there are only 10 subscribers to VIEWS UK, and I would really like to see more. If you would like me to publish a brand new issue 56, then I would need to have at least 100 subscribers before I start work on it. There is no point in me starting work on the new issue unless there are enough expected readers of the new publication.

Please follow the instructions in my recent blog post if you would like to subscribe to VIEWS UK.