topic Increase the max number of groups, how to in Graphics Programming

Increase the max number of groups, how to

Sticky — Fri, 26 Aug 2011 03:40:11 GMT

Is there any way to increase the max number of groups for groups= option for BARCHART in the GTL? I seem to have hit the limit with 1092 groups. Interestingly proc sgplot doesn't seem to have the same limit.

Increase the max number of groups, how to

Jay54 — Fri, 26 Aug 2011 13:09:18 GMT

ODS Graphics limits the number of discrete values or groups to 1000 to prevent runaway jobs, where a group or category role may be assigned a column (unintionally) that has a very large number of unique values. These are controlled by the DISCRETEMAX and GROUPMAX options on the ODS GRAPHICS statement. You can set these values to a higher level for your needs.

ods graphics / groupmax=1001;

http://support.sas.com/documentation/cdl/en/odsug/62755/HTML/default/viewer.htm#p0kroq43yu0lspn16hk1u4c65lti.htm

Increase the max number of groups, how to

Sticky — Sun, 28 Aug 2011 23:32:59 GMT

Thanks for this. I new there must be an option somewhere to increase this but its not mentioned in the error message or in the documentation for groups= . The only mention is in regard to increasing the memory available for ODS graphics. Also what is the limit for groups= in proc sgplot?

Increase the max number of groups, how to

Jay54 — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 01:35:35 GMT

I don't expect any difference at all for this scatter plot use case. I just ran this code for SG and GTL, and I got the exact same log message.

data scatter;
  do g=1 to 1001;
    x=ranuni(2);
    y=ranuni(2);
    output;
  end;
run;

ods html close;
ods listing;

 
proc sgplot data=scatter tmplout='c:\max.sas';
  scatter x=x y=y / group=g;
run;

proc template;
  define statgraph max;
    begingraph;
      layout overlay;
        scatterplot x=x y=y / group=g;
      endlayout;
    endgraph;
  end;
run;

/*ods graphics / groupmax=1001;*/
proc sgrender data=scatter template=max;
run;

Increase the max number of groups, how to

Sticky — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 04:56:51 GMT

Looks like I had excluded some obs which meant the no groups dropped below 1000

Re: Increase the max number of groups, how to

SHUO — Fri, 17 Jul 2015 06:55:06 GMT

Thanks Sanjay for what a simple but hard found solution! I Have been searching the SAS Manual for a whole day but only found your answer here!!

Re: Increase the max number of groups, how to

JeanetteBottitta — Wed, 29 Jul 2015 16:23:22 GMT

We are always looking to improve the documentation. I will update the GROUP= option in the next edition of the SAS ODS Graphics Procedures Guide with this information. Thank you!

Re: Increase the max number of groups, how to

Jay54 — Wed, 29 Jul 2015 16:47:27 GMT

Normally, the software will write a note to the log indicating when this has happened, and the name of the option you can use to fix the issue. In this case the note is not logged, sorry about that. I have opened a defect.