Errata for SAS Certified Specialist Prep Guide (2019)

[Nietzsche]

In addition for the official errata, post any errata not included in the official errata that you may have found. 

On page 85, I am pretty sure that should be

data=cert.heart

Since we only ever created cert library in the entire book (except two others for excel demo only), never created or used a clinic library (other than using clinic.admit (pg 44) as an example to explain data statement. Heart.sas is inside cert library.

[Nietzsche]

page 79.  should be work.admit, since it is just a follow up from the example on page 77. work.admit

[Nietzsche]

page 86, possibly used the wrong options, see this thread.

https://communities.sas.com/t5/SAS-Programming/firstobs-obs-not-giving-intended-result/m-p/842653#M3...

[Nietzsche]

page 161. 

cert.cltrials data set in the book printout has 9 observations, but in the data supplied, only have 7 observation.

Now this is after SAS institute told us about the errata from pg 161 to 164 that the correct data is cert.cltrials instead of cert.trials in their official update pdf.

Because of the data is different, the transposed result on page 164 is different from the SAS output.

[Nietzsche]

another issue caused by the difference in data set above is concatenated id on page 162 as mentioned in this thread.

[Nietzsche]

page 181. 

the data set provided in cert.measure is slightly different from the book in that row 6 and 7 in the book are the last two rows in the data set. 

so you will get different result from figure 10.3 on page 182 if you run the code on page 181.

you just sort cert.measure by ID first to  get the same result.

proc sort data=cert.measure out=measure_sorted;
by ID;
run;


data one2one;
set cert.patients;
if age<60;
set measure_sorted;
run;

proc print data=one2one;run;

[Nietzsche]

page 217, both error and missing data.

firstly, it should be cert.CDRates as data sets are not stored in the temp work library. Secondly, the CDRates do not exist at all.

[Nietzsche]

not mentioning fmtsearch= option in chapter 12 on proc format would definitely be counted as a major oversight, I wasted over 3 hours yesterday on this. 

https://communities.sas.com/t5/SAS-Programming/Format-was-not-found-or-could-not-be-loaded/m-p/84397...

[Nietzsche]

Page 263, pretty sure that TODAYDATE is not a function and author missed a line break to break up TODAY and DATE function.

Searched google, can't find TODAYDATE function.

[Nietzsche]

so the TODAYDATE() function also exist in the SAS BASE exam reference guide.

https://communities.sas.com/t5/SAS-Programming/is-TODAYDATE-a-real-function-or-typo/m-p/844275#M3337...

[Nietzsche]

page 244, should be format, not informat?

see

https://communities.sas.com/t5/SAS-Programming/date-informat-in-PROC-IMPORT-confusing-prep-guide-exa...

[Anne_A]

Hello @Nietzsche ,

In this specific case as the data is read I believe informat is the correct phrasing (format would be for how to show a value - informat is to specify how to read one).

Cheers.

[Tom]

---

@Anne_A wrote:

Hello @Nietzsche ,

In this specific case as the data is read I believe informat is the correct phrasing (format would be for how to show a value - informat is to specify how to read one).

Cheers.

---

An INFORMAT is the SAS feature that supports controlling how text strings are converted into values.

This example is showing that PROC IMPORT is able to read files that have dates stored as string in Month/Day/Year order.  PROC IMPORT will decide to use USE the mmddyy informat to do that.  It will also decide to attach the mmddyy format to the variable so that when it is printed it will be display in the same Month/Day/Year order.  

It is NOT an example of how a user could use either an informat or a format directly.  Calling this either informat or format is just confusing especially to learners that might not fully understand what an informat and a format actually are.  

Something like this would be more accurate (and less confusing).

The follow example illustrates reading a CSV that has dates stored in mm/dd/yyyy style.

If they wanted to use it to introduce informat and format as concepts they might add:

Notice how PROC IMPORT generated SAS code that used the MMDDYY10. informat to read the file and attached the MMDDYY10. format to the variable so that it would print in the same mm/dd/yyyy style.

[Anne_A]

Hello @Tom ,

Agreed, of course - I was essentially trying to answer @Nietzsche's assumption that "informat" in the given context should be replaced with format, implying there was a mistake in the Prep Guide (which I happen to own too,as well as the mentioned source file).

"Reading" and "writing" are admittedly shortcuts (here also intended as useful mnemonics), i.e. simplifications that have the advantage of presenting things simply (you might say / think in a simplistic way 🙂), a strategy often used in teaching (and quite clearly used in the Prep Guide), admittedly with the risk of creating misconceptions (which you very thoroughly corrected). 

The page @Nietzsche was referring to is part of a paragraph titled "Reading Dates and Times with Informats" and I was basically using the same vocabulary to answer his question. I was certainly not trying to teach him the difference between format and informat - he has a whole chapter in the Prep Guide for that.

[Nietzsche]

page 399 and 400 should be swapped around.

You can see the results starts with title "Laguardia Flights" and the first group is Dest=CPH PDF printout on page 401. 

But the SAS result start on page 400 and continue on 399. out of order.