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mycotropic
Calcite | Level 5

I've programmed with SAS since 1997 or so and I use SAS daily. I have never had a reason to use the "clear all" button in the right click mouse menu but I use "paste" many times per day on most days. That is I TRY to use "paste" and rarely my mouse is a little off and the next item on the menu is "clear all", boom, all of the SAS code is gone. It comes back of course when I accurately hit "paste" but then I'm in a document that has no name. Obviously I can rename it or choose the original name from the drop down for "save as" so I'm back up and running in very short order. What I don't understand is the purpose of "clear all" in the right click menu and I can't find a way to remove it or move it to a position where I'm less likely to accidentally click it. It's like a pothole at night, waiting there.. waiting for a chance to break my concentration. Insidiously waiting and needlessly present....

 

This is probably a personal problem that effects only me but I'd appreciate two things;

1) an explanation of why that option exists in the right click menu (perhaps also how often people use it)

2) the ability to either move or remove that option from the right click menu

 

Thanks

12 REPLIES 12
snoopy369
Barite | Level 11

1 is easy to answer.  CLEAR ALL is there because a common use case for the older Program Editor, or similarly the ISPF editor, was to type commands in and then submit them - which cleared the screen, because they were being treated as commands, not as a program you wanted to save.  (That's why they had a "recall" option; that brings back the last command you submitted.)  

 

So to give the Enhanced Editor that same functionality for those folks who still preferred the older style of doing things (Hi, Roger!), they have the "clear all" option on the right menu button.

mycotropic
Calcite | Level 5

Thanks! Now that you mention it I see the advanced editor telling me that "proc reg is running" after I use it because it's waiting for further commands which must be the interactive mode you described. My problem is my approach to SAS culture rather than any problem with SAS culture, my inner anthropologist should have recognized that!

snoopy369
Barite | Level 11
Oh, it's not even that; it's decades back really. Back when it was just mainframes, you'd just send code to them and get results. I'm talking 1960s to 1970s here. You didn't have IDEs, you just had a place to send whatever you wrote in a text editor somewhere to the mainframe to run.

I don't think you can customize the right click button outside of certain parts (so for example you can customize it in explorer to do something different when doubleclick a dataset, but only because there's a specific place to do so). I don't see where you'd customize the editor version.
mycotropic
Calcite | Level 5

In 1997 when I learned it was from a programmer that had been using SAS since the 70's. She told me many a tale about early SAS such as why the "cards" statement exists (and she still had a box of cards to prove it). She is an incredibly efficient programmer for exactly this reason and I learned a huge amount about using temporary variables for data cleaning and error detection because of the order of operations that the SAS engine uses and how exactly it does every step. I'm sad when a student doesn't understand _n_ and in=x (in a merge) and stuff like that. I guess I never asked her about "clear all" though!

Kurt_Bremser
Super User

@snoopy369 wrote:
... whatever you wrote in a text editor somewhere to the mainframe to run.



Really? In the 70's? I wrote my first programs (1975/76/77) on a card punch and received the results on hardcopy. If you were lucky, in less than half an hour.

3270-style terminals were not for the unwashed masses, back then. And vi was just being written.

Reeza
Super User

Try deleting it from the toolbar options if you want:

Not sure that will work though for the right click, but I don't use that typically, I use keyboard shortcuts and/or toolbar.

 

delete_customize_toolbar.JPG

mycotropic
Calcite | Level 5

Thanks; I removed it from the toolbar as you indicated and it didn't effect the right click menu. I suppose I should use keyboard commands but for some reason right click is more natural for me. It might be that I think in terms of the mouse because I spend time gaming and the mouse commands are vital. In fact I played video games long before I used SAS so I probably applied game logic and behavior to SAS out of the box.

Okay then, I can blame Civilization 2 and Duke Nukem' for this particular SAS annoyance!

Reeza
Super User

Duke Nukem...haven't heard that one in a while....

mycotropic
Calcite | Level 5

I was wearing a "Duke Nukem' Extreme" t-shirt yesterday.

 

Oh my god, I'm a hoarder!

Reeza
Super User

I remember the game fondly, mostly because I liked it but could never actually play it, I didn't have a windows computer growing up 😞

 

snoopy369
Barite | Level 11
Ha, I do remember enjoying Duke as well back in the day ... and I got my first SAS job from playing Civilization with my then future boss 🙂 Good times...

-Joe
ballardw
Super User

@mycotropic wrote:

I've programmed with SAS since 1997 or so and I use SAS daily. I have never had a reason to use the "clear all" button in the right click mouse menu but I use "paste" many times per day on most days. That is I TRY to use "paste" and rarely my mouse is a little off and the next item on the menu is "clear all", boom, all of the SAS code is gone. It comes back of course when I accurately hit "paste" but then I'm in a document that has no name. Obviously I can rename it or choose the original name from the drop down for "save as" so I'm back up and running in very short order. What I don't understand is the purpose of "clear all" in the right click menu and I can't find a way to remove it or move it to a position where I'm less likely to accidentally click it. It's like a pothole at night, waiting there.. waiting for a chance to break my concentration. Insidiously waiting and needlessly present....

 

This is probably a personal problem that effects only me but I'd appreciate two things;

1) an explanation of why that option exists in the right click menu (perhaps also how often people use it)

2) the ability to either move or remove that option from the right click menu

 

Thanks


I would ask the question why do you use mouse click to paste (or copy) anything? The keyboard  Ctrl-V for paste (at least windows world) means I don't have to move from the key board. I actually spend time looking for keyboard short cuts to avoid the mouse.

 

And for other repetitive things in SAS you may want to investigate the KEYS menu (F9) and editor or SAS commands.

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