SAS Administrator role

[deleted_user]

I recently took over operations of our data warehouse including the SAS report development and administration. The main functions of administration and report development were transfered to an offshore entity. I have been tasked with bringing those functions back onshore (USA).

Can someone help me understand the role of the SAS administrator? We have 4 SAS servers on Solaris (I'd rather migrate to Linux). We have 30 licensed users and generate at most 200 reports each month from multiple data sources (libraries), including the EDW. Do I need a full time SAS admin? Can I combine that role with other Linux-based administration roles? What salary range can I expect to pay for this role?

Sorry for sounding like such a noob, but I'm a noob. Thanks for your input.

Jeff W

[Ksharp]

I also want to know. And also want to know about SAS Programmer.



Ksharp

[TimStearn_SASProductManagement_]

Jeff,

I can't help you with the "money" part of your question, but in terms of tasks/focus the role of a SAS Administrator involves the following types of tasks:

1. Ensuring that the SAS environment is up and functional. You're generally first line support for the environment, with the possible exception of server uptime, which is generally the responsibility of some sort of server IT group. It's also not unusual to see a separate IT group responsible for the uptime of Java Web Application Servers (JBoss, WebSphere, WebLogic) that are required for reports.
   
2. Applying hotfixes and upgrades to SAS software and assisting with client-side program installations.
   
3. Administering metadata security and user/group creation
   
4. Answering questions about general SAS usage and/or assisting with program optimization/debugging.
   

That last one isn't necessarily an admin task, but many of our SAS Administrators seem to become involved in this task (either because they have a background in SAS programming or their users assume administrators are experts in all the software pieces).



There are quite a few other tasks you may become involved in, but those are the highest frequency tasks we see across most of our customers.



Thanks,



Tim Stearn

[deleted_user]

Thanks for the input Tim.
Based on best practices how would you manage such a resource? Are there checklists, logs, daily tasks to perform, etc. or some particular report format you use to have a SAS administrator report his activities to his manager?

Jeff