Philip Holland

VIEWS News 67 (2022Q1) has been published!

VIEWS News issue 67 has now been published.

Happy New Year! This newsletter issue will be a graphics special, as it contains an article from our new VIEWS Consultant Robert Allison (The Graph Guy) about cleaning up your graphs, and I’ve written a solution to creating box plots with geometric means. As usual I have publicised some SAS-related events for the next few months, and I have also added some more SAS formats, options and functions that you may or may not have come across before, but you might find interesting, and even useful.

If you would like to contribute an article, to re-visit and improve an existing article, or just discuss the possibility of doing so, please feel free to send an email to me at view-uk@hollandnumerics.org.uk or phil@hollandnumerics.org.uk.

To be able to read this and all previous issues you will need to follow these steps:

If you have not already registered on this blog site, go to blog.hollandnumerics.org.uk and register for free membership.
Once successfully registered, click the menu item [Subscriptions for Forums and Features] > [Request access to the VIEWS UK forum] to request free access to the VIEWS UK forum, then add your name and email address to the form before clicking [Send].
On receipt of a request for an existing blog member I will register them for free access to the VIEWS UK forum, and then send them an email to confirm this.
The next time they log onto the blog site they will see VIEWS UK in the forum list, where you will find the latest issue of VIEWS News, forum topics to find the backissues, functions and formats in every published issue, and a tag cloud covering every forum on the site to which you have access, including VIEWS UK and the VIEWS News issues.
They will also be automatically informed of any VIEWS UK updates.

Enjoy!……………..Phil

The Home page of my Blog Site has changed, but it may not be immediately obvious where!

Until today I have used the WordPress Classic Editor to create and maintain my blog site posts and pages, but for the new Home Page and this post I have started using the new Gutenberg Block Editor. The question on your lips is then “Why?”. Much of the new functionality introduced recently into WordPress has been dependent on Gutenberg Blocks, which allows the web pages to be created from simple building blocks, like Lego. In particular, I was looking for a way to include an action button at the top of the Home page which would only appear if the user had not yet logged into the blog, because much of this site depends on knowing about the profile and membership level of the user. Gutenberg Blocks has just such a block, and I have used it at the top of the Home page, but if you have already logged in, then it is hidden.

So what are the changes to the Home page?

At the top of the page users that have not yet logged-in will see a big button saying “–> YOU ARE NOT LOGGED IN! <–“. Clicking that button will take you to the login page.
Near the bottom of the page there was a table explaining the different membership levels, which had merged cells in the Membership Level column to show you what was relevant to that level. Unfortunately, Gutenberg Blocks does not yet allow merged cells, so, in the new table, I have had to add a blank row between each level, which is why it looks a little different. Merged cells will be implemented as soon as they become available.
The rest of the page looks remarkably unchanged, but it now uses Paragraph and List blocks.
Finally, you may notice that the Total views counter at the top-right of the page now has a much smaller number. That is because the new Home page is a brand new page. The original Home page had 26,970 views! It is now up to you to get that view count back above 20,000!

Poll: What stops you registering on this blog site?

I am curious to know why blog site visitors stop short of actually registering for Free membership, so I thought I’d create a quick poll to find out a little more, as answers to all these concerns are explained on the Home and Privacy Policy pages:

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I will use the results of the poll to improve the blog site.

Thanks in advance…………….Phil

Free advertising for active recruiters globally! SAS-related Jobs from Recruiters in the UK, USA, Canada and India in February 2022

Looking for a SAS-related job?

There are a number of SAS-related jobs in the SAS Jobs Listing this month in the UK, USA, Canada and India, and the links are open to all site visitors:

India: Pharmaceutical permanent positions from ClinChoice.
USA: Pharmaceutical permanent and contract positions from ClinChoice.
Canada: Pharmaceutical permanent and contract positions from ClinChoice.
UK: Consultancy permanent positions from Odin Consultancy.

Please use the links in the SAS Jobs Listing to apply for these positions. All recruiters have contact details and links to their web sites on each job post.

Recruiters looking for candidates

I’m always looking for new recruiters to post SAS-related jobs on this site covering India, UK, the Americas, Europe and the Rest of the World. In particular, I would like to include jobs in the Europe, where nearly 15% of the registered blog members are located and jobs have been posted for them in the past, but currently this area has no active recruiters.

If you have a regular supply of SAS jobs in any of these regions, then there is a free trial which is open to all recruiters, but with 2 simple rules:

The free trial will be extended by an additional calendar month only when a job is posted, and will expire automatically if no job has been posted in a calendar month.
The posted jobs must be in some way SAS-related.

Please register for Free membership, and then send your jobs to phil@hollandnumerics.org.uk before 02Mar2022 to be included in this post next month! You will be manually upgraded to a Recruiter member if you’ve never taken part in this free trial before.

The current regional breakdown of registered blog members is as follows, but note that the SAS Jobs Listing is open to all site visitors:

Indian sub-continent: 35.8% (285)
The Americas: 23.2% (185)
UK: 19.9% (158)
Europe: 14.5% (115)
Rest of the World: 6.5% (52)

“Interested” (revisited) – What you can do to improve the way employers see you!

Previously, in ‘“Interested” – I have no idea what that means!‘, I talked about blindly responding to LinkedIn posts, and how it would change how employers see you. This post is a follow-up to help you correct some of your previous behaviour and give a better impression of yourself.

I don’t believe LinkedIn really understands how to encourage and measure genuine discussions, so it has decided to count responses to posts as a measure of engagement, and provided, by default, messaging suggestions for every comment. These, apparently, are generated by ‘machine learning’, which only means that the more you use them, the more often they will appear.

Do you want your discussions to be generated by a machine? I sincerely hope not, and employers would prefer to get to know the real you too!

The first step to getting your real identity would be to prevent these ‘machine’ suggestions appearing altogether. There is a menu called [Messaging experience] in your LinkedIn settings under [Communications]. The menu looks like this on my laptop:

In the [Messaging experience] menu you can switch off [Messaging suggestions], and then you will have to write your own replies. This may seem to be a lot of hard work, but, hopefully, you’ll no longer appear to be a machine, but a human again!

Now you are free to express yourself. Remember to read the whole job post, because a good recruiter will always include a link or email address you can use to apply for the job, so use it, and don’t reply “Interested” on Linkedin (or even worse, post your email address, which could be a security risk to you, and suggest to a future employer that you are a security risk!).

Good luck!…………..Phil

“Interested” – I have no idea what that means!

Sometimes I am truly baffled by responses posted to messages in LinkedIn. Maybe it is due to my advancing age? However, while I may be getting old, I’m fairly sure that isn’t the whole story. I think many LinkedIn users are getting lazy, and LinkedIn is encouraging this laziness in the search for “engagement” by supplying quick and easy 1-click replies, which alas mean very little. To me the use of these shortcuts does suggest a general lack of understanding of how to portray oneself online, and, if that is true, as an employer, I would probably remove them immediately from any interview list, because a SAS programmer must be able to read, understand and respond clearly to specifications, just like we all did when answering questions in examinations. It is fortunate then that I’m not an employer!

Let me give you an example. Each month I post links to my monthly SAS job summary blog post in a number of LinkedIn groups. While I’m happy to start a conversation about the post, what I’m really expecting is for readers to click on the link and read the blog post. Every now and then a group member replies with “Interested”, and sometimes even an email address too (which to me is a sign of a potential security risk!). I have no idea what that means, so I’ve started responding as follows:

Please note that I am a job advertising platform administrator, not a recruiter. On my blog site all jobs should be applied for using the Apply links within the job posts, so you are sent to the corresponding recruiter directly.

However, I would recommend you to join us and register for free on my blog site, Holland Numerics: Blog and Forums at http://blog.hollandnumerics.org.uk, to discuss SAS-related topics and receive monthly summary emails about current SAS jobs posted on the site. Please visit this site if you need more details.

As a registered member, why not post an article in the SAS Skills Discussion Forum to introduce yourself to recruiters registered on the blog? Don’t forget to tag your own name in your article, as they will both be included in the Forum Tag Cloud.

Also, if you would like free access to the VIEWS newsletter archive, 55 issues of SAS hints and tips, then please let me know. Publications restarted in 2019, and the new issues will be published in February, May, August and November each year.

OK I’m advertising my blog site too, but no-one can say there is any ambiguity in my reply!

Another common response is a quick and meaningless reply like “Okay”, “Thanks”, “Sure” or 👍, when I’m asking several questions together, or when I’m just informing them that I have disconnected from them in LinkedIn. For these responses I have another stock reply:

You will learn over time that to be a real SAS programmer, or a Data Scientist, actions speak louder than words. I realise there is a cultural background to agreeing on the Indian Sub-continent that makes it the polite thing to do, but, to any colleagues you may work with in the future from the UK, Europe and North America, “Okay”, “Thanks” or “Sure” in answer to a request means “I am already doing it”!

Maybe I’m being a little harsh, but I truly believe that you can get further in your career by writing with clarity and purpose at all times!

Interested? 😉

Apologies for the 16 hour server outage today. Note to self: if an installation manual doesn’t mention something important, then don’t try it out in production!

Apologies for the 16 hour server outage on my SAS-related blog site today. I was trying to install Jitsi Meet, an open-source alternative to Zoom, on my server:

While it is possible to organise moderated meeting using the hosted meet.jit.si servers, installing a self-hosted copy of the open-source Jitsi Meet software alongside WordPress seemed to me to be a good idea, so that SAS training could easily be held locally.
By default standard self-hosted Jitsi Meet uses Nginx, not Apache, web servers, and assumes a fully qualified hostname, e.g. meet.hollandnumerics.org.uk.
What I wanted to create was an installation of Jitsi Meet in a sub-folder on my existing Apache web site, e.g. hollandnumerics.org.uk/meet, which is also part of a Bitnami stack, where software is installed specifically for use by the web server. This use case was not mentioned anywhere in the installation manual, although I did find a number of web forums that described similar environments.
That is where the problems started:
1. To move Jitsi Meet into a sub-folder I had to edit the existing web configuration, the web pages to display the meetings, and the scripts to start the software.
2. I also had to generate a self-signed SSL certificate for localhost.
3. I had to reboot the server and restart the web service several times.
4. Finally I discovered that some of my changes were lost whenever the Jitsi Meet software was updated.
At no point did I ever get Jitsi Meet to a point where I could run a test meeting, so I uninstalled it all.
Having uninstalled Jitsi Meet, I then couldn’t restart the web server to access WordPress, because something was holding onto port 443 (the secure HTTP port). At this point it was fast approaching midnight, so I decided to sleep on it.
Finally, this morning, I found that, when Jitsi Meet had been installed, it had added “Listen 443” commands to the default Apache installation, which conflicted with my Bitnami stack Apache server. Once these were removed my WordPress site suddenly reappeared!

Lessons learned:

When installing software you don’t fully understand, if the installation instructions have no information explaining what you should do, don’t just do it anyway!

Thank you for your patience!

Happy New Year! Free advertising for active recruiters globally! SAS-related Jobs from Recruiters in the UK, USA and Canada in January 2022

Looking for a SAS-related job?

There are a number of SAS-related jobs in the SAS Jobs Listing this month in the UK, USA and Canada, and the links are open to all site visitors:

UK: Consultancy permanent positions from Odin Consultancy.
USA: Pharmaceutical contract positions from ClinChoice.
Canada: Pharmaceutical permanent and contract positions from ClinChoice.

Please use the links in the SAS Jobs Listing to apply for these positions. All recruiters have contact details and links to their web sites on each job post.

Recruiters looking for candidates

I’m always looking for new recruiters to post SAS-related jobs on this site covering India, UK, the Americas, Europe and the Rest of the World. In particular, I would like to include jobs in the Europe and India, where 50% of the registered blog members are located and jobs have been posted for them in the past, but currently these areas have no active recruiters there.

If you have a regular supply of SAS jobs in any of these regions, then there is a free trial which is open to all recruiters, but with 2 simple rules:

The free trial will be extended by an additional calendar month only when a job is posted, and will expire automatically if no job has been posted in a calendar month.
The posted jobs must be in some way SAS-related.

Please register for Free membership, and then send your jobs to phil@hollandnumerics.org.uk before 02Feb2022 to be included in this post next month! You will be manually upgraded to a Recruiter member if you’ve never taken part in this free trial before.

The current regional breakdown of registered blog members is as follows, but note that the SAS Jobs Listing is open to all site visitors:

Indian sub-continent: 35.6% (283)
The Americas: 23.3% (185)
UK: 20.0% (159)
Europe: 14.6% (116)
Rest of the World: 6.5% (52)

Do you have children who would benefit from mathematics, spelling or logic practice? I have an offer for Christmas, New Year and Spring 2022 and it is FREE!!

I know everyone is offering Black Friday discounts, but I live in the UK and traditionally we had Boxing Day (the day after Christmas Day) sales. However, again 2021 has not been a normal year, and it is ending with worries for everyone, so yet again I’m offering free access to my Educational Games membership, but this time from now until 31Mar2022 for all applicants.

It is not really free, of course, as I’d like feedback about any of the 7 different educational web app games included in the package, but I’ll be happy to extend the free period by an extra month each time for anyone that sends me constructive comments about the games. I would like to develop these games further, so your comments will help to set the direction for my updates. See my blog post “A little more to help the children learn – no SAS involved!” for more details.

Note that Programming and Recruiter memberships are not compatible with the Educational Games membership, so if you have these membership levels, then I would strongly recommend that you create a new blog profile for this offer, and I will make sure that no marketing emails are sent to the new profiles from the blog site too.

Applications for free access until 31Mar2022 should be emailed to phil@hollandnumerics.org.uk from your blog profile email address.

Merry Christmas and a Safe, Healthy, Happy 2022 (in advance)!………..Phil

Seeking active recruiters globally! SAS-related Jobs from Recruiters in the UK, USA and Canada in December 2021

Looking for a SAS-related job?

There are a number of SAS-related jobs in the SAS Jobs Listing this month in the UK, USA and Canada, and the links are open to all site visitors:

UK: Consultancy permanent positions from Odin Consultancy.
USA: Pharmaceutical contract positions from ClinChoice.
Canada: Pharmaceutical permanent and contract positions from ClinChoice.

Please use the links in the SAS Jobs Listing to apply for these positions. All recruiters have contact details and links to their web sites on each job post.

Recruiters looking for candidates

I’m always looking for new recruiters to post SAS-related jobs on this site covering India, UK, the Americas, Europe and the Rest of the World. In particular, I would like to include jobs in the Europe and India, where 50% of the registered blog members are located and jobs have been posted for them in the past, but currently these areas have no active recruiters there.

If you have a regular supply of SAS jobs in any of these regions, then there is a free trial which is open to all recruiters, but with 2 simple rules:

The free trial will be extended by an additional calendar month only when a job is posted, and will expire automatically if no job has been posted in a calendar month.
The posted jobs must be in some way SAS-related.

Please register for Free membership, and then send your jobs to phil@hollandnumerics.org.uk before 05Jan2022 to be included in this post next month! You will be manually upgraded to a Recruiter member if you’ve never taken part in this free trial before.

The current regional breakdown of registered blog members is as follows, but note that the SAS Jobs Listing is open to all site visitors:

Indian sub-continent: 35.6% (283)
The Americas: 23.3% (185)
UK: 20.0% (159)
Europe: 14.6% (116)
Rest of the World: 6.5% (52)

VIEWS News 66 (2021Q4) has been published!

VIEWS News issue 66 has now been published. It is a little later than planned. This is why I plan for November, but December is still Q4!

This newsletter issue will be a SAS macro special, as it contains an article from our new VIEWS Consultant Jay Iyengar about managing macro variables, and I’ve written a solution to a macro problem posed by Anders Sköllermo. As usual I have publicised some SAS-related events for the next few months, and I have also added some more SAS formats, options and functions that you may or may not have come across before, but you might find interesting, and even useful. First, though, is some news about SAS Global Forum 2022!

To be able to read this and all previous issues you will need to follow these steps:

If you have not already registered on this blog site, go to blog.hollandnumerics.org.uk and register for free membership.
Once successfully registered, click the menu item [Subscriptions for Forums and Features] > [Request access to the VIEWS UK forum] to request free access to the VIEWS UK forum, then add your name and email address to the form before clicking [Send].
On receipt of a request for an existing blog member I will register them for free access to the VIEWS UK forum, and then send them an email to confirm this.
The next time they log onto the blog site they will see VIEWS UK in the forum list, where you will find the latest issue of VIEWS News, forum topics to find the backissues, functions and formats in every published issue, and a tag cloud covering every forum on the site to which you have access, including VIEWS UK and the VIEWS News issues.
They will also be automatically informed of any VIEWS UK updates.

Enjoy!……………..Phil

VIEWS News issue 66 (2021Q4) is awaiting approval for publication and will appear later this month. Here is how to access VIEWS News issues…

VIEWS News issue 66 (2021Q4) is awaiting approval for publication and will appear later this month.

Recommended approach to accessing VIEWS News issues from #1, if you have already registered for free blog membership and requested access to the VIEWS UK forum:

Always log onto the site using Member Login from the menu at https://hollandnumerics.org.uk first. The site will ask you to join if you try to use a restricted link before logging on!
Having successfully logged on, scroll to the bottom of the web page and click on the link to VIEWS UK in the Forum List. Note that you already have access if you can see VIEWS UK in the Forum List.
If you are looking for a specific issue click on VIEWS News – Backissues.
If you are looking for a specific topic (including issues where you have articles) click on Forum tag cloud.

I hope this makes your searching easier……………Phil