What is the difference using line plot and line plot wizard under SAS Enterprise Guide

[ycenycute]

This is a very general question. What is the difference in using line plot and line plot wizard? What are the pros and cons of the two? Sorry if this is a duplicate question.

[ballardw]

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@ycenycute wrote:

This is a very general question. What is the difference in using line plot and line plot wizard? What are the pros and cons of the two? Sorry if this is a duplicate question.

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I am assuming by "using line plot" you mean some code written by you or another programmer.

Generic comment about wizards: You can only do /select options that the wizard programmer allows. Quite often due to interaction between options and the possibly complexity not all combinations of options are available and generally only the most common option combinations are available.

With writing your own code you can access the option combinations or features directly and do not rely on someone guessing what you may want. The trade off is that you may need to read the documentation and experiment to get what you want.

"Line plots" could be in Procs Sgplot/Sgpanel, created with the Graphic Template Language for more control, or even as the result of plot requests to some modeling procedures.So more details could be needed to properly address your concerns.

Anecdote: Once upon a time I worked in a shop that used a different statistics package. There were options available in the report Table wizard that were not documented in the documentation. There were features, that I thought were basic, not available in the wizard menus. Typically I would use a wizard to get close to what I wanted and save the code generated. Then modify the code to add in the pieces I wanted.

[ycenycute]

Not really. I am talking about Task, then graph, then line plot or line plot wizard. There are two options, one is line plot, and the other line plot wizard. So what is the difference between the two?

[ycenycute]

Not really. I am talking about Task, then graph, then line plot or line plot wizard. There are two options, one is line plot, and the other line plot wizard. So what is the difference between the two?

[Reeza · Accepted solution]

The Wizard walks you through all the options like whereas the Tasks sort of expects you to know what you're doing and where to click. Consider the Wizard like having a tour guide and the Tasks like someone who's read all the guide book and is exploring on their own.

FYI - If the wizards and tasks are generating GPLOT code I would not recommend using either, you should switch to SGPLOT.