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Rating: 
Summary: Essential for the programmer analyst crowd.
Review: I have a masters degree in taxation. My company logically put me to work doing data analysis and project development. I use SAS, VB, ACCESS, EXCEL, whatever gets the job done. I do not speak, nor do I want to speak, COBOL. SAS is my only avenue to Main Frame data. What is available from SAS and from third parties is disgusting. This book is like the many comprehensive Windows books. I had never used SAS variable arrays before and this book taught me all I need to know. Probably not for the super SAS geek, but for those many of us needing to do our own data access and analysis using SAS, definitely the most complete single volume on the market. Well worth the money.
Rating: 
Summary: Disappointing but not that bad
Review: In stark contrast to the title, this book is NOT for professionals, at least not professional programmers, and certainly not for anyone who wishes to become a professional SAS programmer. Any secrets in this book are destined to remain secrets of the authors after the reader has read them. Consider, for example, the half page on transporting files between computers. The only "secret" revealed is that it can be done, but not a word is said as to how. Finally, the 6.08-6.10 "update" is a very brief, uninformative appendix. The book is really about Release 6.06 and before, i.e. it is seriously out of date, despite its recent publication date. This book might possibly be slightly useful to managers who need to write technobabble about why they are advocating the use of SAS as a data management environment. It will be of negligeable value to anyone who will actually be called upon to accomplish serious work using the SAS language.
Rating:
Summary: Needs to be updated
Review: Not perfect, but excellent. After looking at the reviews on Amazon, I decided to postpone buying this book. My mistake. The is the best book on the SAS language within one set of covers. It should not be your first introduction to SAS, but after you have your feet wet and decide to jump in all the way, it is a must have. In any situation you find yourself programming in SAS, you will not use all SAS has to offer. Certainly if you plan to take the certificataion test you will need to know more and this is one of the aids you need. Rick, or Mr. Aster to me, uses English, real English, the way people think and talk, to descibe SAS computereze. Yes, it's heavily technical, but most people once they start thinking in the technical language cannot weave in and out of regular English. Rick can.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent
Review: Not perfect, but excellent. After looking at the reviews on Amazon, I decided to postpone buying this book. My mistake. The is the best book on the SAS language within one set of covers. It should not be your first introduction to SAS, but after you have your feet wet and decide to jump in all the way, it is a must have. In any situation you find yourself programming in SAS, you will not use all SAS has to offer. Certainly if you plan to take the certificataion test you will need to know more and this is one of the aids you need. Rick, or Mr. Aster to me, uses English, real English, the way people think and talk, to descibe SAS computereze. Yes, it's heavily technical, but most people once they start thinking in the technical language cannot weave in and out of regular English. Rick can.
Rating:
Summary: Needs to be updated
Review: This was an excellent book at the time it was written, but needs to be updated for the more recent versions of SAS and for changes of terminology usage prompted by relational data bases.
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