The New Library Wizard does its job beautifully. As a SAS administrator, I appreciate how the wizard makes creating metadata libraries easy. I start the wizard, pick a template for the data source, fill in a few screens of information, click Finish and Voilà! One newly defined metadata library.   But occasionally I need to create a library for a data source that does not have a template – and that is where the Generic Library template shines. Basically, if I can write a LIBNAME statement to access the data, the Generic Library template will let me create a metadata library to access the data.   Keep reading to see the steps for using the Generic Library template and an example creating a library for data accessed through the SAS PC Files Server. The example steps can easily be adapted to other data sources.   Background References If you are not familiar with Metadata libraries, the LIBNAME statement, or using the New Library Wizard from either SAS Management Console or from SAS Data Integration Studio, use the references below to get a quick overview.   Metadata Libraries: SAS® 9.4 Intelligence Platform: Data Administration Guide, Assigning Libraries SAS® 9.4 Intelligence Platform: Data Administration Guide, Connecting to Common Data Sources LIBNAME statement: SAS® 9.4 and SAS® Viya® 3.3 Programming Documentation / Global Statements, LIBNAME Statement SAS/ACCESS® 9.4 Interface to PC Files: Reference, LIBNAME Statement Syntax for the PCFILES Engine for the LIBNAME statement used in the example. New Library Wizard: Use the Help feature in either SAS Data Integration Studio or SAS Management Console, Data Library Manager to read more about the New Library Wizard.   General Steps for Using the Generic Library Template These are the general steps for using the Generic Library template to make a new metadata library:   Write (and test!) the LIBNAME statement to access the data. Create the new Metadata library by completing the Generic Library template using the information from the LIBNAME statement. Verify that the newly created Metadata library will generate the correct LIBNAME statement. The example below shows more details for each of these steps.   Creating a Library for Data Accessed Through the SAS PC Files Server Write (and test!) a LIBNAME statement to access the data. For this example, the data for the library is in a Microsoft Access database file that is being accessed using the SAS PC Files Server. The file is located at 'C:\ClassData\MSAccessData\orion_shoes.accdb' on the workspace server machine and we want to limit access to read-only. The following LIBNAME statement will access the data correctly:   LIBNAME shoes PCFILES PATH='C:\ClassData\MSAccessData\orion_shoes.accdb' ACCESS=readonly;   Before starting the New Library wizard, you should identify the libref and engine from the LIBNAME statement. Also note all the other specifications after the engine name. For this example, you would identify:   Libref shoes Engine PCFILES All other specification PATH='C:\ClassData\MSAccessData\orion_shoes.accdb' ACCESS=readonly   Create the new Metadata library by completing the Generic Library template using the information from the LIBNAME statement.   Start the New Library Wizard. For this example, I’m starting the Wizard from the Data Library Manager in SAS Management Console.     Select the Generic Library template.       Step through the Wizard screens. On the first screen, name the library, add a description (optional), and select a metadata folder location to store the new library.     Continue with the next screen and select the application server(s).     The library properties screen is where you will need to refer the LIBNAME statement you wrote (and tested) earlier. Fill in the Libref and Engine fields. Put all other specification from the LIBNAME statement into the Other Options field.   Keep in mind that there is no error checking in the Other Options field, so it is important to test the LIBNAME statement before proceeding to creating the metadata library.     Note: If the LIBNAME statement referred to a physical directory without using the PATH= keyword, you could place the directory name in the Path Specification, Selected Items field. Since our LIBNAME statement was referring to a file instead of a directory, it needed the PATH= keyword and therefore was placed in the Other Options field.   Finish the wizard to create the new library. Verify that the newly created Metadata library will generate the correct LIBNAME statement. From Data Library Manager right click on the newly created library and select Display LIBNAME Statement.     The output should match your original LIBNAME statement (options may appear in a different order). For this example, you can see that the generated LIBNAME statement matches the original LIBNAME statement.     The new metadata library should work correctly to access the data through the PC Files Server.   Final Thoughts Hopefully you now have an idea of how to use the Generic Library template to create metadata libraries. Basically, if you can write the LIBNAME statement for a data source, you should be able to use the New Library wizard and the Generic Library template to define a metadata library to access the same data. ... View more

  In a multi-tier deployment of the SAS Intelligence Platform, starting and stopping the SAS servers has to follow a specific order.   Until recently, I thought that the only choices for starting and stopping the servers in  a multi-tier SAS deployment was to do it manually (ugh!), write custom scripts (fun, but time-consuming), or look for a third-party tool to manage the process.  None of these choices is ideal in terms of being easy to use and easy to implement.   Then I came across the SAS Global Forum Paper, An Oasis of Serenity in a Sea of Chaos: Automating the Management of Your UNIX/Linux Multi-tiered SAS® Services, which describes the SAS Local Services Management (SAS_lsm) utility.    What is the SAS_lsm utility? A quick summary of the SAS_lsm utility is that it uses a configuration file customized to your deployment and ssh commands to orchestrate the operation of the SAS servers. It leverages the sas.servers script on each machine and offers a single command to start, stop, and check the status of the SAS servers across all the tiers in your deployment.  For more details see Usage Note 58231: Utility that manages multi-tiered SAS® services for Unix/Linux deployments.   After reading about the SAS_lsm utility, it seemed like it would be easy to use and easy to install, and much better than the methods I'd used previously. Of course, the best way to get familiar with the SAS_lsm utility is to try it.   Trying the SAS_lsm utility I decided to try the SAS_lsm utility on a SAS deployment with six Linux machines: three of the six Linux machines are used for a Metadata cluster, two of the Linux machines are used as Application servers, and the remaining Linux machine is used for the Middle tier. The start-up order, tier name and a short description for each machine is listed in the table below; the shut-down order will be the opposite of the start-up order.   Start-up Order Tier Name hostname Description 1 Meta meta.demo.sas.com Metadata node (first configured node) 2 Meta2 meta2.demo.sas.com Metadata node 3 Meta3 meta3.demo.sas.com Metadata node 4 AppSrv compute.demo.sas.com SAS Application Server (general application server) 5 AppSrvVA va.demo.sas.com SAS Application Server (supporting Visual Analytics) 6 MidTier webapp.demo.sas.com Middle Tier   Prerequisites    There were only two prerequisites listed for installing and using the SAS_lsm utility: BASH shell installed. Multi-directional SSH enabled for the SAS installation account. Both of these prerequisites were met in my SAS environment, therefore, I didn't need to spend any time setting them up .  If your environment doesn't meet these prerequisites, a quick Internet search will give you instructions on installing the BASH shell or setting up SSH.   Installation of the SAS_lsm utility   I followed the steps outlined in Usage Note 58231: Utility that manages multi-tiered SAS® services for Unix/Linux deployments for downloading and installing the SAS_lsm utility to the Meta machine. The installation, including the download and running the installation script, took just a few minutes.    Configuration of the SAS_lsm utility   The configuration was also very straight forward. The Global Forum Paper contained detailed examples that were easy to adapt for my environment.  Here is the configuration file for my deployment:   # SAS CONFIGURATION DIRECTORY (E.G. /sas/9.4/config/Lev1) # if you have unique SAS CONFIGURATION directories in your TIERED deployment, you # can remove the SASCONFIG variable definition and then provide the absolute # path to your SAS CONFIGURATION directory on a TIER by TIER basis SASCONFIG=/opt/sas/config/Lev1 # SAS INSTALLER USERID # if you have unique SAS INSTALLER userids in your TIERED deployment, you # can remove the SASINST variable definition and then provide the unique # SAS INSTALLER userids on a TIER by TIER basis SASINST=sas # START IDENTIFY TIER DETAILS IN THEIR STARTUP ORDER (METADATA, COMPUTE, MIDTIER) TIERNAME[1]='Meta' TIERINST[1]="${SASINST}" TIERHOST[1]="meta.demo.sas.com" TIERSTAR[1]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers start" TIERSTOP[1]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers stop" TIERREST[1]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers restart" TIERSTAT[1]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers status" TIERSTAS[1]='is NOT up' TIERSTOS[1]='is UP' TIERNAME[2]='Meta2' TIERINST[2]="${SASINST}" TIERHOST[2]="meta2.demo.sas.com" TIERSTAR[2]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers start" TIERSTOP[2]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers stop" TIERREST[2]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers restart" TIERSTAT[2]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers status" TIERSTAS[2]='is NOT up' TIERSTOS[2]='is UP' TIERNAME[3]='Meta3' TIERINST[3]="${SASINST}" TIERHOST[3]="meta3.demo.sas.com" TIERSTAR[3]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers start" TIERSTOP[3]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers stop" TIERREST[3]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers restart" TIERSTAT[3]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers status" TIERSTAS[3]='is NOT up' TIERSTOS[3]='is UP' TIERNAME[4]='AppSrv' TIERINST[4]="${SASINST}" TIERHOST[4]="compute.demo.sas.com" TIERSTAR[4]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers start" TIERSTOP[4]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers stop" TIERREST[4]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers restart" TIERSTAT[4]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers status" TIERSTAS[4]='is NOT up' TIERSTOS[4]='is UP' TIERNAME[5]='AppSrvVA' TIERINST[5]="${SASINST}" TIERHOST[5]="va.demo.sas.com" TIERSTAR[5]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers start" TIERSTOP[5]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers stop" TIERREST[5]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers restart" TIERSTAT[5]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers status" TIERSTAS[5]='is NOT up' TIERSTOS[5]='is UP' TIERNAME[6]='Midtier' TIERINST[6]="${SASINST}" TIERHOST[6]="webapp.demo.sas.com" TIERSTAR[6]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers start" TIERSTOP[6]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers stop" TIERREST[6]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers restart" TIERSTAT[6]="${SASCONFIG}/sas.servers status" TIERSTAS[6]='is NOT up' TIERSTOS[6]='is UP' # END IDENTIFY TIER DETAILS IN THEIR STARTUP ORDER (METADATA, COMPUTE, MIDTIER) # NUMBER OF TIERS MAXTIERS=6 # NUMBER OF RETRIES MAXRETRY=60 # SLEEP INTERVAL IN SECONDS PER RETRY SLEEP=5 # STATUS REPORT ROOT DIRECTORY (default is /tmp unless otherwise specified) STATUSROOT=/tmp # SAS ADMINISTRATOR EMAIL ADDRESSES SASADMIN="Admin_email@sas.com"   You may use any name for the configuration file; I used the default name of multi-tier-MCM.template.   Setting up the configuration file, including time spent referring to examples in the Global Forum Paper , took me between 15 and 20 minutes. I had already read through the paper once and had a good idea what the configuration file needed.  You should plan for a little longer setup for your first time configuring the utility.   Using the SAS_lsm command   Once I had the SAS_lsm utility configured, the commands to start, stop, and check the status of the SAS servers worked flawlessly.   Executing the SAS_lsm command without any argument will give these brief usage notes:   <<USAGE>> [bash | sh] SAS_lsm [-a <NUM> | -o <NUM> | -s] -c <CFG>   WHERE     -a NUM     start deployment tier services from tier NUM to MAXTIERS     -o NUM     stop deployment tier services from MAXTIERS to tier NUM     -s         provide status of all deployment tier services     -c CFG     specify configuration file   NOTE    -a, -o, and -s options are not to be run concurrently   For my environment, here are the exact commands I used to control the SAS servers across all machines in the deployment:   Start the SAS servers   bash SAS_lsm -a 1 -c multi-tier-MCM.template Check the status of the SAS servers   bash SAS_lsm -s -c multi-tier-MCM.template Stop the SAS servers   bash SAS_lsm -o 1 -c multi-tier-MCM.template   Refer to the Global Forum Paper for more on the SAS_lsm command and its options.   Key Takeaways   I was delighted at how straightforward the SAS_lsm utility was to install and how easily  it worked. It will be part of my SAS Administrator's toolkit of tips, tricks, and techniques going forward. Plan for some extra time when you first install the SAS_lsm utility. For this blog, I spent about 1.5 hours total. This time included reading the Global Forum Paper, reading the Usage Note and performing the installation along with basic testing of the SAS_lsm command. Next time I install the utility I expect it will take roughly 20 minutes. Having a single command that can operate the SAS servers in a multi-tier deployment is enormously helpful. The more machines hosting SAS servers in your deployment, the more helpful having a single command to operate them all becomes. The SAS_lsm utility offers an additional feature to collect log files from the various SAS servers it controls - this is great for troubleshooting. Refer to the the utility's documentation for more information. The SAS_lsm utility has flexibility that I didn't explore in this blog. It can be used to control more than just the servers in the sas.servers script. With a bit of scripting work, you could use the SAS_lsm command to orchestrate other non-SAS servers that need to start along with the SAS servers. ... View more