NOTE: Metadata-Bound Libraries - Updates at SGF 2013 #sasgf13

Back in November last year I mentioned Metadata-Bound Libraries. This v9.3 M2 (and above) functionality allows you to force access to your data through metadata libraries, thereby enforcing your metadata security plans.

One of the nuggets of information I learned at SAS Global Forum 2013 was that v9.4 will introduce menus in SAS Management Console to ease the effort of building PROC AUTHLIB code. Plus, the process of unbinding data sets from the metadata libraries will be made easier and simpler. Currently, one has to copy the data sets to an unbound library; v9.4 will allow unbinding to be performed in-place.

In a future release, administrators will optionally be able to make encryption compulsory for all data sets and libraries; and support for AES encryption will be provided. Finally, the metadata server will be able to store the encryption key and send it (encrypted) when required. This will remove the current need to hard-code keys into batch code (and thereby remove the security weakness).

NOTE: SAS Global Forum 2014 #sasgf14

No sooner has SAS Global Forum 2013 finished than we get to see the 2014 web site. Next year's conference is in Washington, D.C. between March 23rd and 26th.

I hear there are some changes afoot in the organisation of the conference.  Along with the absence of a Closing Session at this year's conference, there was no announcement of section chairs for the streams of papers in next year's conference. The web site offers no further information on section chairs, but it does tell us that the Call For Content opens in July. This appears to be different to previous years' Call For Papers, and it's much earlier in the year too. All-in-all, I'm intrigued to see what the plan is.

I clearly need to get my skates on and do more than just think about next year's papers over the next few months.

Improve Your Mobile Typing (KALQ)

I didn't see this paper presented at SAS Global Forum(!) even though there's plenty of pattern matching and analytics involved in the project, but maybe I'd have benefited from having the associated software installed on my Android tablet whilst writing notes and blog posts.

It's (yet another) alternative keyboard for mobile (phone and tablet) devices. It dares to diverge from QWERTY, and it's thumb-focused, i.e. it doesn't expect you to be a Mavis Beacon alumni. Thus, the researchers claim "it will take about 8 hours of practice to reach the typing rate that is comparable to that of a regular Qwerty keyboard on the same device. Practice beyond that point will improve the rate further". However, it promises much because the layout has the following properties:

• The division of work is almost equal, at 54% and 46% for the right and left thumb, respectively.
• Alternation is rapid: 62% of the taps are switches.
• Travel distances are short: On average, the left thumb moves 86 px, the right 117.
• The space bar is centrally located.
• The right thumb handles all vowels except y. The clustering of vowels around the space bar favours quick switches and minimises travel distance. The right thumb is responsible for 64% of same-side taps.
• The left thumb has most of the consonants, exploiting its ability to hover above the next button sooner. It has most first letters of words and most of the consonants.

I'll confess. I bought a Nexus 7 in San Francisco, sitting alongside my Galaxy Nexus phone and my Asus TF101 tablet/laptop. Yes, I'm an Android fan. But, in my defence, the battery on my Asus had run dry and I'd brought the wrong recharging kit, so what was I to do!

I saw a lot of people at SGF writing notes on tablets and phones, so KALQ has a large target market. I'm going to try it on my Nexus 7. I'll let you know if it's a success.

NOTE: High-Availability Metadata #sasgf13

One of the most notable features of v9.4 wasn't mentioned in the SAS Global Forum Technology Connection but I caught a paper by Bryan Wolfe on the subject. SAS v9.4 will remove SAS's most notable "single point of failure" - the metadata server. SAS architects and administrators will optionally be able to specify and create a cluster of metadata servers (with real-time shared data) to mitigate metadata server failure.

For those with SAS systems providing high value operational services, this enhancement could be a key deciding factor in choosing to upgrade to v9.4. Sites with less demanding applications can choose to retain a single metadata server.

Whilst SAS has hitherto offered a large degree of resilience for failure of most processes and servers (particularly with the use of Grid and EGO), the metadata server has always been a weak link. V9.4 resolves this shortcoming by introducing the ability to cluster a group of metadata servers, all of whom are running 24x7, communicating with each other, and able to take-over the work of a failed metadata server.

The coordinated cluster of metadata servers appears as a normal metadata server to SAS users. Hence, no code changes will be required if your site implements this technology. The chosen approach is intrinsically scalable.

The cluster requires three or more nodes; each is a full metadata server. One is nominally a master, the others are slaves. The system decides who is the master at any point in time. Each metadata server must have access to a shared backup disk area.

Client connections go to slaves. Load balancing causes redirects when required. The load balancing means that read performance is the same or better when compared with v9.3 performance. To keep all metadata server instances synchronised, slaves pass write requests to the master, and the master then passes those requests asynchronously to all other slaves so that they can update their own copy of the metadata storage (in-memory and on disk).

SAS clients (such as Enterprise Guide and Data Integration Studio) keep a list of all nodes. Each client is responsible for reconnection. This is transparent to users. Hence, in the event of a slave failure, the client will automatically establish communication with an alternate server. If the master fails, the remaining slaves need to negitiate with each other to "elect" a new master. As a result, there can be a more noticeable delay, although it's unlikely to exceed 10 seconds.

The new functionality will be supported in v9.4 on all SAS platforms except IBM Z/OS. All metadata servers must be on the same OS. The cluster license is included in SAS Integration Technologies. Unlike some of SAS's other high availability and failover solutions, no additional 3rd party software is required.

All-in-all, this is a very significant enhancement for those who rely on their SAS systems to reliably deliver information, knowledge and decisions.

NOTE: SAS Global Forum 2013 Feedback #sasgf13

I just completed the conference survey. Overall I had a good conference - nobody booed during either of my papers, so that's a positive outcome! I liked the conference city (San Francisco), the conference venue was relatively compact (avoiding long walks between papers), I attended a number of well-presented papers, I learned useful stuff about current releases of SAS plus additional stuff about forthcoming SAS releases and how to plan for them.

I tried to offer some constructive feedback in my survey. Here's what I wrote. What do you think? Did your experiences match (or diverge)?

• I was very disappointed to see the loss of the Closing Session. It felt like the conference just petered-out. There was no opportunity to say "thank you" to organisers and volunteers, and no recognition for presenters (best paper??). A big shame


• I was greatly disappointed with the conference wi-fi. Even stood in one place it still seemed to come-and-go, and required a fresh login every time the signal was lost. As an overseas attendee (with very expensive data rates because I was roaming) I relied on conference wi-fi to keep in touch with emails, etc. The wi-fi caused me huge frustration


• I'd like a few more papers on general software development best practice, e.g. requirement, design and testing. It's great to learn about the technology and the language(s), but my clients' investments are wasted if they don't build stuff effectively and efficiently. So, I don't mean papers about syntax, I mean advice, recommendations and experience about the operation of a SAS development and support team


• I liked the conference's Android app. Hopefully it'll be a bit more "finished" next year, e.g. maps of the venue included in the app rather than requiring an internet connection to access them (see my comments re: conference wi-fi above). The ability to search for papers by name-of-author would be appreciated. An ability to filter My Agenda would be much appreciated because it involved a lot of scrolling to see my plans for Wednesday (having to scroll past Sunday, Monday and Tuesday to see Wednesday)


• I enjoyed the keynotes from Billy Beane and Roger Craig. Both were eloquent and amusing speakers, but both were talking about analytics and hence there was a strong tie-in with the conference.

Organising a conference is a demanding task. Organising an international conference for 4,200 attendees must be a mammoth task. My list of "enhancement opportunities" is miniscule when viewed in the context of the conference's organisers achievements. But there's no harm in trying to make next year's even better!

NOTE: Editing SAS #sasgf13

I don't get to write many SAS programs these days,  less still Base SAS code. However, I couldn't help but be impressed by the Macumba editor that was described and demonstrated by Michael Weisz of Bayer Pharma yesterday at SAS Global Forum. Sadly, it is not commercially available. The ability to do DATA step debugging  *and* macro debugging blew me away.