Updated May 26, 2023

Introduction to Advantages of SAS

SAS is a statistical software package the SAS organization offers for data analytics implementations. SAS accepts input data sources such as flat files, databases, and other applications. SAS supports its proprietary language known as SAS programming for complex data processing. It is a scalable software that can manage a high volume of data for analytics and has very good enterprise support for data governance and security. SAS provides built-in features for several data processing through its Graphical user interface(GUI). SAS has high-quality machine learning and output generation features for data analytics. SAS is an industry-leading tool for analytics services.

Top 9 Advantages of SAS

Below is a list of the advantages of SAS explained in detail,

1. Easy to Understand and Learn

SAS has a very simple and easily understandable syntax.
Anybody without prior programming knowledge can easily learn the SAS programming language, as its syntax is simple.
SAS coding includes simple and basic statements.
SAS language helps the user to solve complex issues which were impossible before.
It is more like commanding a machine to carry out some specific tasks.

2. Easily Debuggable

SAS is an easily understandable programming language due to its simple syntax.
The process of debugging is very effective and simple in the SAS language.
The log window of the SAS tool displays all the errors and warnings clearly so that they can be corrected on the go.

3. Large Database Management Ability

SAS has extensive capability in managing large databases more easily and effectively.
One can make the right choices by adding and managing enormous data volumes.

4. High Data Security

SAS is a major business analytics tool used by most enterprises in the market today.
SAS provides high levels of security for the company’s data.
A proper license is required to extract data from SAS, even for official purposes.
Data manipulation is impossible with the data security provided by the SAS tool.
This is the main reason for the wide popularity of SAS in the business world.
SAS is professionally favored over other analytical languages, including R programming language.
The popularity of R is also because it’s an open-source tool. And because of this, data security cannot be guaranteed in R.

5. Proper Customer Care Services

Various organizations receive proper customer support from SAS.
SAS can be regarded as an exceptional organization for analyzing data, supported by a robust customer support system.
The SAS organization can only alter SAS as it is not an open-source tool.
SAS customer support handles all sorts of customer issues well.

6. Thoroughly Evaluated Algorithms

The SAS developers thoroughly analyze, test, and verify all the implemented algorithms in SAS.
The SAS team intensively tests and verifies all versions of SAS in a well-managed environment before their official release.
These testing and verifications are feasible only because SAS is not open-source software.

7. Astounding Graphical User Interface (GUI)

Statistical analysis was made much easier by the SAS language for normal people who are not programmers.
SAS offers an astonishing Graphical User Interface for developers.
SAS GUI provides numerous tools like plots, graphs, and a flexible library.

8. Accurate Output

The development of SAS occurred over a long period.
It offers accurate and well-formatted output, which is easily understandable.

9. Huge Job Opportunities

The job possibilities in SAS are very high, as numerous enterprises used it for a long time.
SAS has become more essential to begin an analytics profession for developers.
It is very for a SAS professional to master Python and R.
SAS has become the leader in the analytics market over the years.

Disadvantages of SAS

Below is a list of the disadvantages of sas explained in detail,

1. Not an Open-Source

SAS is not as quick as R in implementing new machine learning-related algorithms.
This is because R programming language is an open-source tool, and SAS language is a closed-source software.
Unlike SAS, which operates in a restricted and protected environment, R, an open-source tool, can be operated by anyone.
SAS algorithms are not open for common public usage and only in licensed versions.
Moreover, unlike the R programming language, SAS is transparently unavailable for research purposes for the public.

2. Highly-Priced

One of the crucial disadvantages of SAS is its high cost.
It is absolute software in its closed environment.
Public access to SAS functions and applications is restricted without proper licenses.
Because of all these reasons, it is highly expensive.

3. Poor Graphic Representation

Even though SAS has an amazing GUI, R has a better and more advanced graphic representation.
R has a much more compatible graphic representation.
Compared to SAS, R has diverse graphic representation options.

4. Tougher than R

SAS follows a procedural programmatic approach compared to R.
Lines of code in SAS are a lot more than in R.
R makes the applications of the latest technologies like machine learning and statistical learning more straightforward compared to SAS.
R offers packages that are expensive in SAS for free.
Packages such as text mining and serial time formatting are generally more expensive in SAS compared to the R programming language.

5. Difficulty in Text Mining

People refer to the extraction of useful pieces of information from text data as text mining.
R offers text mining for free of cost, but text mining in SAS is costly.
It is like decrypting a code in the form of text.
It helps make proper decisions from the information you decode from the text.
People perform text conversion to create useful data for making proper decisions and conducting the proper analysis.

Conclusion

In this article on the Advantages of SAS, we had a walkthrough of both advantages and disadvantages of the SAS language. SAS is preferred by big enterprises due to its high levels of security compared to R, which is popular among freelancers and considered less secure than SAS.

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