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SAS Visual Analytics

SAS Visual Analytics

Overview

What is SAS Visual Analytics?

SAS Visual Analytics provides a complete platform for analytics visualization, enabling users to identify patterns and relationships in data that weren't initially evident. Interactive, self-service BI and reporting capabilities are combined with out-of-the-box advanced analytics so everyone can discover insights…

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Recent Reviews

TrustRadius Insights

SAS Visual Analytics has proven to be a valuable tool for organizations dealing with big data, allowing them to present complex statistics …
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Awards

Products that are considered exceptional by their customers based on a variety of criteria win TrustRadius awards. Learn more about the types of TrustRadius awards to make the best purchase decision. More about TrustRadius Awards

Popular Features

View all 28 features
  • Drill-down analysis (13)
    9.0
    90%
  • Publish to PDF (13)
    9.0
    90%
  • Formatting capabilities (13)
    8.0
    80%
  • Pixel Perfect reports (12)
    8.0
    80%
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Pricing

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SAS Visual Analytics for SAS Cloud

Cloud
Annual By Users: 5, 10, 20

Entry-level set up fee?

  • No setup fee

Offerings

  • Free Trial
  • Free/Freemium Version
  • Premium Consulting/Integration Services
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Product Demos

Configuring prompts for different data sources in SAS Visual Analytics

YouTube

Creating Tables and Charts in SAS Visual Analytics | Lecture #2 | SAS VA Demo | SAS VA Training

YouTube

SAS Demo | SAS Graph Builder: Custom Line Chart with Reference Line

YouTube

SAS Demo | Data Entry in SAS Visual Analytics using SAS Viya Jobs

YouTube

SAS Demo | How to prompt for a date range in a SAS Visual Analytics report

YouTube

SAS Demo | Using Common Filters in SAS Visual Analytics

YouTube
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Features

BI Standard Reporting

Standard reporting means pre-built or canned reports available to users without having to create them.

8.3
Avg 8.2

Ad-hoc Reporting

Ad-Hoc Reports are reports built by the user to meet highly specific requirements.

8.8
Avg 8.1

Report Output and Scheduling

Ability to schedule and manager report output.

9.2
Avg 8.4

Data Discovery and Visualization

Data Discovery and Visualization is the analysis of multiple data sources in a search for patterns and outliers and the ability to represent the data visually.

9.7
Avg 8.1

Access Control and Security

Access control means being able to determine who has access to which data.

8.3
Avg 8.6

Mobile Capabilities

Support for mobile devices like smartphones and tablets.

8.3
Avg 7.9

Application Program Interfaces (APIs) / Embedding

APIs are a set of routines, protocols, and tools for used for embedding one application in another

9.2
Avg 7.9
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Product Details

What is SAS Visual Analytics?

SAS Visual Analytics provides a complete platform for analytics visualization, enabling users to identify patterns and relationships in data that weren't initially evident. Interactive, self-service BI and reporting capabilities are combined with out-of-the-box advanced analytics so everyone can discover insights from any size and type of data, including text.

BI & Analytics Features

Platform

  • Administration via Windows App
  • Administration via Web Interface
  • Live Connection to External Data
  • Snapshot of External Data
  • Multi-Data Source Reporting (Blending)
  • ETL Capability
  • ETL Scheduler

Supported Data Sources

  • MS Excel Workbooks
  • Text Files (CSV, etc)
  • Oracle
  • MS SQL Server
  • IBM DB2
  • PostgreSQL
  • ODBC
  • Cloudera Hadoop
  • Hortonworks Hadoop
  • EMC Greenplum
  • IBM Netezza
  • HP Vertica
  • SAP Hana
  • Teradata
  • Salesforce
  • SAP
  • Google Analytics

Standard Reporting Features

  • Customizable dashboards
  • Report formatting templates

Ad-hoc Reporting Features

  • Drill-down analysis
  • Output formatting
  • Predictive modeling
  • Report sharing & collaboration

Report Output & Scheduling Features

  • Publish to Web
  • Publish to PDF
  • Output raw supporting data
  • Report delivery scheduling

Data Discovery & Visualization Features

  • Multiple pre-built visualization formats (heatmaps, scatter plots, etc.)
  • Location analytics/geographic visualization
  • Predictive analytics
  • Machine learning models
  • Pattern recognition & data mining
  • Integration with R/other statistical packages

Access Control and Security Features

  • Multi-user support (named login)
  • Role-based security model
  • Multiple access permission levels (Create/Read/Delete)
  • Report-level access control
  • Table-level access control (BI-layer)
  • Row-level access control (BI-layer)

Mobile Capabilities

  • Responsive design for web access
  • Dedicated iOS application
  • Dedicated Android application
  • Dashboard/Report/Visualization mobile interactivity

Additional Features

  • SAS Visual Analytics also includes web-based self-service data preparation, text analytics, forecasting, pathing, prescriptive and descriptive analytics.

SAS Visual Analytics Screenshots

Screenshot of Explore your data using analytics and interactive data visualizations.

SAS Visual Analytics Integrations

SAS Visual Analytics Technical Details

Deployment TypesOn-premise, Software as a Service (SaaS), Cloud, or Web-Based
Operating SystemsWindows, Linux
Mobile ApplicationApple iOS, Android, Windows Phone
Supported CountriesGlobal
Supported Languages26

Frequently Asked Questions

SAS Visual Analytics provides a complete platform for analytics visualization, enabling users to identify patterns and relationships in data that weren't initially evident. Interactive, self-service BI and reporting capabilities are combined with out-of-the-box advanced analytics so everyone can discover insights from any size and type of data, including text.

Reviewers rate Report sharing and collaboration and Report Delivery Scheduling and Pre-built visualization formats (heatmaps, scatter plots etc.) highest, with a score of 10.

The most common users of SAS Visual Analytics are from Enterprises (1,001+ employees).

SAS Visual Analytics Customer Size Distribution

Consumers0%
Small Businesses (1-50 employees)5%
Mid-Size Companies (51-500 employees)25%
Enterprises (more than 500 employees)70%
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Comparisons

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Reviews and Ratings

(76)

Community Insights

TrustRadius Insights are summaries of user sentiment data from TrustRadius reviews and, when necessary, 3rd-party data sources. Have feedback on this content? Let us know!

SAS Visual Analytics has proven to be a valuable tool for organizations dealing with big data, allowing them to present complex statistics in a meaningful way. Users have found that the software helps them identify correlations that may not be evident at first glance. For example, the fraud, risk, and marketing teams have utilized SAS Visual Analytics for portfolio analysis of various clients. They have been able to gain insights into client behavior and make data-driven decisions.

Multiple departments, including marketing and SRM, have used SAS Visual Analytics to create dashboards that facilitate easier analytics usage. This has allowed them to monitor key metrics and track performance effectively. Additionally, some organizations have leveraged the software to analyze medical data and identify trends and improvements in the healthcare sector.

Another use case for SAS Visual Analytics is attrition analysis. In one instance, a small department focused on merchant solutions used the software to understand why people were leaving and where they were going. By analyzing the available data, they were able to identify patterns and take proactive measures to reduce attrition.

The software has also been utilized for report generation and building interactive dashboards based on census data and website logs. Users find that the tool helps them keep their data organized and presentable, allowing for quick and efficient information retrieval.

SAS Visual Analytics excels at identifying data types and filtering data fields as per specific requirements, providing accurate results in a systematic manner. Users have compared its interface to that of SPSS combined with R language, making it easy for them to relate to and use the software effectively.

Marketing agencies and database consulting firms have found value in using SAS Visual Analytics to provide BI dashboards to clients. This allows clients to access updated data and analyze metrics of interest easily.

Internally, SAS Visual Analytics has been used for exploration purposes, such as decision trees and network diagrams. The software has proven valuable in visualizing credit risk data for regulatory reporting and analysis, helping users identify gaps in data quality and understand the data from a business standpoint. Overall, SAS Visual Analytics provides users with a versatile platform to derive insights and make informed decisions across various industries and departments.

Fast and Efficient Data Presentation: Users consistently praise SAS VA for its speed and efficiency in presenting data across various axes. Many reviewers state that the tool allows them to quickly analyze large volumes of data and generate meaningful insights.

Comprehensive Analytics Package: Reviewers appreciate that SAS VA offers both ETL, Extract, Transform, Load, and analytics capabilities in one package. This comprehensive suite of features makes it a valuable tool for users who need to perform a wide range of tasks from data extraction to advanced analytics.

Easy-to-Use Interface with Drag-and-Drop Functionality: The user interface of SAS VA has been commended for its simplicity and ease of use. Multiple reviewers mention the drag-and-drop functionality, which allows users to easily perform complex analytics tasks without requiring extensive coding or technical expertise.

Poor Customer Support: Several users have reported experiencing issues with the customer support of the software. They have mentioned that when they reached out for help, they were directed to contact their site admin instead, leading to frustration and delays in resolving their concerns.

Large Installation File Size: Some reviewers have found the size of the installation file to be a problem, especially for remote employees or areas with poor networking. This has caused difficulties in downloading and installing the software, impacting productivity and user experience.

Lack of Tutorials for Beginners: A common complaint among users is the lack of tutorials specifically designed for beginners. They feel that more resources are needed, particularly on the presentation side of the software, to assist new users in understanding its features and functionalities better.

Users report that SAS Visual Analytics offers accurate outputs compared to other products. They recommend trying out SAS Visual Analytics to determine its fit for business needs. Users also praise the great algorithm of SAS Visual Analytics. Consideration of SAS Visual Analytics is recommended, especially for handling large data and utilizing SAS Viya for end-to-end data science modeling and visualization. However, users advise against making tables with SAS Visual Analytics. Despite being an expensive tool, it is deemed worthwhile for businesses needing information integration and dialog boxes. Suggestions include incorporating simulation models and creating a more affordable version for small companies. SAS Visual Analytics provides a free trial, in-person training, and documentation for webinars as well as online cloud-based performance support. It is considered an ideal software for developing predictive models and creating descriptive tables for statistical business analysis. Although SAS Visual Analytics is good for visualization and data exploration, some users find the installation process challenging and the data load process complex for batch loads. Nonetheless, users recommend it for efficient coding and graph creation. Lastly, some users find SAS Visual Analytics easy and efficient to analyze data on campus and uncover student trends, suggesting it as a good tool with minimal training required in the Visual Analytics domain.

Attribute Ratings

Reviews

(1-15 of 15)
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Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
SAS Visual Analytics is used to keep the data in a presentable way which helps in finding any data in less span of time without wasting time.<br>The business problem we address is data found at the time when we need but it took too much time to find out accurate data at the moment which is now possible through the SAS Visual Analytics software. It provides accurate data within less span of time in a very systematic way.
  • It helps in providing the accurate analysis
  • It helps in Better understanding the data
  • It helps is sharing the data easily
  • Sometimes it gives the biased data
  • It need to provide tutorials for new beginners
I was in a meeting with the client and there I have to show them some analytic data to them. But I was confused about how I will manage to show big data to clients with accuracy. But then the SAS Visual Analytics software helps me in presenting accurate data at the moment and it was very presentable and through that, I got the deal for that business.
Raman Ahuja | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
SAS Business Intelligence is mainly used by the analytics teams across organizations in order to create interactive reports and dashboards. The employees are not dependent [on] clunky Excel reports and dashboard[s] anymore and are able to have access to reports, dashboards, and insights on the go with the help of mobile apps. Also, lot of features are inbuilt to do predictive analysis as well instead of just descriptive analysis.
  • Provides the flexibility to the end user to slice and dice the data.
  • Anyone can make predictive models with the help of in-built algorithms without the need to write a single line of code or knowledge of what's under the hood of algorithms.
  • The feature to simply ask a question related to data and getting a response in form of text, chart or graph is amazing.
  • SAS Business Intelligence is very expensive.
  • There is a steep learning curve to be proficient at using SAS Business Intelligence even for people experienced with BASE SAS.
  • Limited functionality as it doesn't integrate with open source tools like Julia, Python or R.
SAS Business Intelligence is more suited to organizations which are already using SAS as the primary software for their analytics needs. Learning curve is relatively shorter for teams already skilled in BASE SAS. For organizations already working with open source software like Julia and Python, it doesn't make much sense to use SAS BI.
Thomas Young | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
SAS Business Intelligence is used in the department for creating user-friendly, nice-looking graphics that are easy to follow and automatically update or require minimal effort to update. SAS Business Intelligence solves the problem of offering simple real-time analytics and data visualization for users that are not technically oriented.
  • SAS Business Intelligence is very easy to set up and automate. Very easy.
  • SAS Business Intelligence graphics are above average, and the user interactivity is generally better than others in the industry.
  • SAS Business Intelligence makes doing advanced calculations much easier than other tools. That may be because the software uses SAS programming behind the scenes, and users that know SAS programming will find it easier to create business intelligence charts.
  • SAS Business Intelligence is generally slower than other business intelligence platforms. This surprised me because I've been a SAS user for 15 years and have found base SAS to be the most responsive and fastest processing tools around. Not sure why the SAS Business Intelligence is behind the other tools for processing speed.
  • Although SAS Business Intelligence offers many default graphics, rearranging things is not as easy as other business intelligence tools.
  • SAS Business Intelligence needs to work on improving the drill-down capability of the business intelligence charts. The software is behind other business intelligence tools that have been in the market for much longer.
SAS Business Intelligence is well-suited for companies that already have employees doing SAS programming or companies that want to move into a more advanced, paid business intelligence platform. The software is a natural extension of the base SAS system, and base SAS programmers should enjoy the visual capabilities offered by SAS Business Intelligence. The software, of course, is not only for established SAS customers. It is easy enough for non-SAS programmers to figure it out, but it will be easier for experienced professionals. SAS Business Intelligence is ideal for companies looking to have reports automated, such as accounting reports, processing reports, statistical reports, and various other business reports. The software is not appropriate for one or two person shops, unless you are the type that wants to create reports for yourself. I think it would be hard to justify the cost if the company does not have executives interested in real-time visualization and analytics. If they're not going to use it, it's not useful.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
SAS Business Intelligence provides a valuable and powerful way to allow our end-users to query our data on an ad-hoc basis. Business Intelligence allows us to present the data to our users with pre-defined joins and available data elements assisting the users in designing and executing queries without requiring additional technical assistance. This provides both a cost and time savings to our technical teams.
  • Presentation of complex data in an easy-to-understand layout
  • Self-service querying of data on both mobile and desktop devices
  • Business Objects allows users to save report layouts for use in future queries
  • Business Objects should provide a more consistent mobile/desktop interface so operation between the two is seamless
  • Business Objects needs to make it easier to query across disparate data sets such as Oracle to SQL to Mongo DB
  • Our installation of Business Objects does not natively allow the export of XLSX documents, only XLS
  • Business Intelligence is excellent for ad-hoc query implementations. We are able to provide connections to numerous data sets through a consistent user interface
  • Business Intelligence is amazing for hiding the database implementation from users and presenting ONLY what you wish them to see
  • Business Intelligence is less for suited for a seamless integration into a web site as reports are generally presented through the BO report interface
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
I use SAS Visual Analytics to build reports for my coworkers. I build dashboards based on census data and website logs. The dashboards are all interactive and the user can choose themes or subsets. They do not have any software (except Office) for those analyses besides what I provide them and they are all happy with the results.
  • Very fast, even with tens of millions of records
  • Nice visually
  • Simple to use with mostly drag and drop
  • Sorting with values not used in a chart or table
  • Views built from a table instead of always creating a table
Reporting to users who do not have access to specialized software Dashboards with a lot of interactivity, so users decide by themselves what characteristics they want to see. Integrates very well with other SAS products.
February 22, 2018

A great product

Donald Wildeboer | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
SAS Business Intelligence is being used primarily in our Research and Analytics departments to evaluate program changes that we might make going forward. It really is only used by a few departments by company employees who are considered subject matter experts. Other departments use the outputs that we generate to make their business decisions. Another major use is for math intensive tasks.
  • I use SAS daily to not only analyze data, producing reports and other outputs, but also to replicate our entire financial system to verify/duplicate calculations.
  • Using SAS we are able to duplicate all business logic and system calculations on our local desktop.
  • When there is odd behavior (a bug) in our financial calculations my SAS programs, which are entirely external to our core system, are often used to help identify what/where the problems occurred.
  • The cost for SAS Business Intelligence con prove to be a little bit prohibitive.
  • The training for SAS Business Intelligence is often difficult to arrange and has often been canceled due to not enough people enrolled.
  • Support at Universities used to be limited but I hear that this is changing.
SAS Business Intelligence is well suited for large corporations that have a demand for scalability and reliability to provide insights into the information that is often housed in their large systems.
Tapan Jain | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
SAS BI is being used by Local and Central Analytics teams to generate custom insights for advertisers, vertical level insights and to create various predictive models. SAS BI is used mostly by the Analytics teams. Since we are in AdTech industry, we deal with billions of rows of digital impression data which is mined to make sense using SAS BI. SAS BI directly connects to Vertica (SQL Database) and help us summarize the data and gather some insights on how to optimize the campaigns.
  • SAS BI makes it very easy to create interactive dashboards even for someone who is not from an IT background. For some specific requirements, basic knowledge of SQL is good enough.
  • A lot of functions have been predefined which makes it very convenient to create dashboards and reports. One doesn't need to be from an IT or a programming background to understand and create dashboards.
  • It supports other programming languages like R and also has a seamless API integration with various data management platforms.
  • SAS is relatively expensive when compared to other BI tools and requires a large amount of upfront fee which becomes an issue for smaller organizations.
  • UI for the dashboards looks a little date in comparison to competitors like Tableau and Microstrategy.
  • Integration with other open source software like Python needs to be built in.
SAS BI is a great BI tool as it incorporates the advantage of SAS which is proven to be robust over the years. SAS BI is more suitable for a relatively larger organization which is looking for self-service BI tools where most of the users are not technically proficient. Also, since license fee is an on a higher end, smaller organizations will find it hard to afford SAS.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use SAS Visual Analytics in visualising credit risk data for Regulatory reporting and Analysis. It has been very helpful in finding the gaps in data quality and understanding the data better from a business standpoint.
  • Visualisation capabilities.
  • Statistical techniques.
  • Integration with most of the data sources.
  • Features from competitors like Tableau, PowerBI, etc.
  • Basic Data modelling (star and snowflake) for data transformation before dashboards.
  • Performance Tuning.
It is well suited for companies which are already in SAS environment and have lot of data in SAS for Analytics. If you don't have any SAS products or expertise, this need not be the first SAS tool you should look at. Explore Tableau, PowerBI and assess based on "fit for purpose."
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
SAS Visual Analytics was used to identify data type, and for filtering data fields as per requirements. For me, it appeared like SPSS combined with R language. This interface is very helpful and made it easy for me to use the software. To get the desired result and output, it is very easy to relate. For regular R users, writing algorithms is very easy and visuals appear side by side.
  • Stock market analysis.
  • Resource utilization and optimization.
  • Pivot table analysis.
  • Customizing a report as per the user requirement.
  • Adding more color and font styles. Presenting data in a more colorful way.
  • The website has a lot of tutorials which is more inclined to the technical side. Maybe add more to the presentation side as well.
For the industry I was working it, it was very well suited. We conducted regular analytics of the number of orders completed a week. It gave us insight on how we grew week to week. While it was easy to work on quantifiable data, it was difficult to work on qualitative data. One suggestion I would add is that if SAS could provide options that would allow qualitative data to be quantified.
February 20, 2017

Preferred by our users.

Mike Narumiya | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 5 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
It is used by a single department. We use it to better analyze our medical data we receive to look for trends and benchmark area results and improvements. This is a new method for us, and we are still evaluating the need.
  • Our staff are familiar with it as it is a common tool. Our training and implementation was short.
  • Installation was easy. Our staff was able to deploy to the receiving department relatively quickly. Though the download was a pretty good size.
  • Seems to crunch through large volumes of data (millions of records) pretty quickly as I've received no complaints on this front from staff.
  • Support. Have had billing and license/key issues. The first time my staff reached out to support, they recommended contacting our site admin for help (me). If we could help ourselves, why would we contact? Support seems lacking.
  • Download. The install file is huge and can be an issue for remote employees, or areas where networking is poor.
Its best suited for a staff that already knows how to use it. If they don't, might look for a simpler solution.
October 18, 2016

Eye Candy on steroids

Ian Macintosh | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
SAS Visual Analytics is one of our key products. It allows us to present detailed and complex statistics in a meaningful way. It also allows us to look at the data with 'fresh eyes' and see correlations that may not otherwise be evident. For 'big data' organizations this is a great tool.
  • Present data across a range of axis in a meaningful way
  • bring out correlations that could lead to some interesting research
  • it's FAST!
  • Securing individual records or fields from view
  • additional view types
It is particularly well suited to big data collections that have good structure. It is not really designed for unstructured datasets (documents, etc). Its strength is the processing speed (particularly when implemented on Hadoop). It is not cheap but it is worth it!
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We are an agency that provides marketing and database consulting solutions to multiple clients. Depending on the needs of the client we use SAS Visual Analytics to provide BI dashboards where client can get access to updated data as soon as it is available and drill down on the metrics they are interested in. It also allows them to export the data behind a chart (bar chart, pie chart etc.) in different formats.
We also use it internally for exploration, we have used decision trees and network diagrams in the past.
  • Visualization of large amount of data is faster because of the SAS engine behind it.
  • Features like decision trees, box plot, scatter plot, and histogram are very easy to use for exploring large data. It also has some unique features like Sankey Diagrams which can be used to show a flow of a process.
  • Customization options for the design of reports, making it visually more appealing.
  • Better HTML5 support.
  • More tutorial videos or literature on the features that are present in SAs visual analytics
Well Suited for:
Providing BI dashboards that can be accessed across multiple devices.
Visualizing/exploring large amounts of data.

Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
It is majorly used to explore our data and discover new patterns. It aids in answering any curious mind's research questions. And most importantly it helps share the answers and the insights to relevant stakeholders in all the ways they can understand. It makes the data analyst's job easier and decision maker's decisions smarter.
  • Robust software
  • Amazing Microsoft Office Integration
  • Always increasing number of features
  • It can be sometimes be little clunky
  • Need for seamless integration with more external softwares like R
  • Installation, maintenance and user management can be made more simpler
Substantial discounts to plenty of industries, ample of users to support the ever growing community and industry specific solutions that work; all make it extremely appropriate for us.
Nicole Jagusztyn | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
The Institutional Research Department at the college uses the full functionality of SAS BI to manipulate data, and produce reports and dashboards. These products are placed on the SAS Information Delivery Portal for use by administrators, deans and other staff across the college in data-driven decision making. Having a centralized repository for reports that are timely, interactive and easy to use has helped our employees in their decision making.
  • Collect and combine data from multiple sources. For example, data from the college database, the National Student Clearinghouse and our student services tracking software can combine to feed one report.
  • Condense millions of rows of data into a single, easy to use report. For example, we can produce a cube that is collapsed at a high level, and users can drill down to their area of interest in seconds.
  • Create interactive reports. It was important that our reports contained the ability for users to play with the data. They had to be able to filter large datasets, drag and drop comparison groups into graphs, and drill down to student-level data. SAS BI provided all of this and more.
  • There will be a steep learning curve for individuals transitioning from BASE SAS to SAS BI. Our department was filled with experienced SAS programmers, but that did little to prepare us for the challenges of SAS BI. Training will be a must.
  • It is possible, but extremely difficult to customize the web-based portions of SAS BI, like the Information Delivery Portal or Web Report Studio. Having an out-of-the box solution is great to get up and coming quickly, but customizing the look and feel for the web-based users will require some previous web design skills.
  • In order to fully appreciate the features of SAS BI, you absolutely need someone on your team with a background in platform administration, security, web design or some other basic IT skills. Alternatively, you may just need strong support from your IT department. Simply having a group of individuals experienced in BASE SAS will not cut it.
Implementing SAS BI will work best when you either have strong IT support or someone on your team with IT experience. We naively went into this adventure with a group of researchers who could not fully articulate what a virtual server was. That was a mistake. SAS BI is typically installed in a multi-tier, multi-server environment. Getting the server configuration and server sizing correct from the outset is critical and the SAS organization can only help so much without inside knowledge of the needs of your organization.
SAS BI is also well-suited for organizations which do not have an existing reporting solution. Previously, our organization had no way to get data into the hands of our users outside of ad-hoc requests delivered as Excel tables or graphs. This was a great way to get up and running quickly delivering interactive reports that are accessible from anywhere and updated daily.
Erik Larsen | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
This product is used by several departments across the organization. While it was slow getting groups engaged, it has solved the problem of accumulating data from different sources into one place where it can be reported on and analyzed, thus serving the need of having the identical data pulls across all organizations. It also solved the issue with having analysts using thin-client to access the data which alleviated the need to have software installed on their workstations.
  • Providing a seamless data access engine to monitor utilization of credit lines across several lines of business. Pulling data from Teradata, Oracle, DB2, Netezza and others to be combined into a single data source for reporting
  • Ability to analyze data through thin client which is able to access the data on the network
  • Reporting software which is also thin client and can be productionalized to refresh at any time.
  • Software setup and administration can be cumbersome if you do not have the right people to tune the product to operate efficiently
  • Data Integration product can be difficult for those who do not already have some data processing experience.
  • Difficult to get some departments to buy in to using the product as they are siloed into another product.
It is best suited to when you have different data sources that need to be combined. It does not require a sourcing team (such as MicroStrategy) which needs to combine the data into one schema before you can start joining data.The question to ask is "Are you going to have a dedicated administrator?" This is a full time job and this person (persons) need to focus on that and not be expected to also analyze the data.
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