Discussion of how users of Visual Analytics handle MISSING data

[mhamlett]

sas va 7.3 is great at showing me data that is there, but sometimes i want to focus on the data that does not exist.

the exception cases. for example..

1. i want to see a list of customers who dont have an invoice for a selected date.
2. i want to see a list of customers and the dates that an invoice does not exist
3. i want to see a list of stores that did not submit an inventory for a given accounting period

i have ideas of how to handle this thru sql queries(left outer joins with NULL fields)  and imports into LASR, but wonder if there is a better way.

thanks

[meredithbailey]

Hello mhamlett, 

In order to display data that does not exist or is missing, try using a filter in Report Designer. Before you can apply a filter, please have a visualization with the data you want to use. For your example, you will need to have variables for both customer and invoice date. In the right hand panel, click on Filters and select Add Filter.

Next, you will click on the data item that you want to see missing data for. In this example, you would want to click Date and choose the variable that represents customer’s invoice dates. Then, in Column Templates choose ‘Invoice_Date Missing’ and drag it over to fill the condition. After completing this step, your visualization should update showing the missing invoice dates for your list of customers. Please notify me if you have any more questions regarding this issue.

Best,

Meredith Bailey