[Blindmath] Answers to How to Look at a Humongous SAS Data Set Using JAWS V. 17.0

[Godfrey, Jonathan]

Hi Zac,

I'm pleased you got this sorted, whether on your own, with the help from Theodor or the staff involved in your course.

Somewhere in your comments you suggest it was simple code but hard to track down; well hard enough that you feel it warrants sharing to save someone else from having to go to the lengths you have over the last few days. Thank you for sharing the solution; so often the ultimate solutions are not so readily shared.

My point remains valid, even if you have sorted yourself out. I believe you need to keep your course staff actively involved in meeting your needs.

It's great there are people like Theodor out there just an email away to offer assistance, but praying those busy people can spare the time to read messages coming from the numerous lists some of us follow isn't a recipe for success.

Jonathan

-----Original Message-----
From: Blindmath [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Zach via Blindmath
Sent: Saturday, 30 July 2016 5:18 a.m.
To: 'Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics'
Cc: Zach
Subject: [Blindmath] Answers to How to Look at a Humongous SAS Data Set Using JAWS V. 17.0

I'm writing in hopes that what I've found out will be of use to someone else in the near future. I am blind, use JAWS and SAS. My master's thesis project looks at the relationship between season and heat stress, and the production of milk and milk quality in the Southeastern United States. Between 2014 and 2016, several universities in the Southeast received a multi-dollar grant to survey dairy farmers and collect qualitative and quantitative data concerning farm practices, location, facility design, and genetics' and examine their impact on milk production and quality parameters. The result of the survey and a subset of farms' production records were compiled into two data tables, one an MS Excel and one a SAS data set. 

 

The latter data set containing the subset of farms' production records was so large, my usual attempts to examine the data with PROC PRINT resulted in freezing my PC. I didn't know just how large the data set was, how many columns or observations there were, not even what the column headers were. I wanted to share the piece of code that showed me the information I needed to understand the layout of the data set. It is pasted below:

 

PROC CONTENTS DATA="C:\...\dhia_data.sas7bdat" OUT=DHIA_DATA;

RUN;

 

PROC PRINT DATA=DHIA_DATA;

RUN;

 

That is it. Very simple. In addition, if you want to look at the first ten observation/rows of data, try: 

 

PROC PRINT DATA="C:\...\dhia_data.sas7bdat"(OBS= 10);

RUN;

 

Or say perhaps the data between observation 10 and 15: 

 

PROC PRINT DATA="C:\...\dhia_data.sas7bdat"(FIRSTOBS= 10 OBS= 15);

RUN;

 

I know you could figure this out for yourself by doing google searches, but hopefully this will save someone out there like me looking for the answers in one location. There is also a way to obtain the information via PROC SQL.
I've just not yet been able to get the code to work. So hopefully for those needing to look at big data sets in SAS, this has been helpful. I have since found out my data set is 412 columns by 85923 observations.

 

 

Regards,

 

Zac

 

Zachary Mason

M.S. Student

Animal and Dairy Sciences

Mississippi State University

 

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