Getting Started with SAS ®

Enterprise Miner 15.2

™

SAS® Documentation
August 4, 2020
The correct bibliographic citation for this manual is as follows: SAS Institute Inc. 2020. Getting Started with SAS® Enterprise Miner™ 15.2. Cary,
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Getting Started with SAS® Enterprise Miner™ 15.2
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15.2-P1:emgsj
Contents

About This Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . v

Chapter 1 • Introduction to SAS Enterprise Miner 15.2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

What Is SAS Enterprise Miner? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
How Does SAS Enterprise Miner Work? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Benefits of Using SAS Enterprise Miner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Accessibility Features of SAS Enterprise Miner 15.2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Getting to Know the Graphical User Interface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

Chapter 2 • Learning by Example: Building and Running a Process Flow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

About the Scenario in This Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Prerequisites for This Example . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Chapter 3 • Set Up the Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

About the Tasks That You Will Perform . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Create a New Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Create a Library . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Create a Data Source . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Create a Diagram and Add the Input Data Node . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

Chapter 4 • Explore the Data and Replace Input Values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

About the Tasks That You Will Perform . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Generate Descriptive Statistics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Partition the Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
Replace Missing Values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Chapter 5 • Build Decision Trees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

About the Tasks That You Will Perform . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Automatically Train and Prune a Decision Tree . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Interactively Train a Decision Tree . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Create a Gradient Boosting Model of the Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Chapter 6 • Impute and Transform, Build Neural Networks, and Build a Regression Model . . 31
About the Tasks That You Will Perform . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Impute Missing Values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Transform Variables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Analyze with a Logistic Regression Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
Analyze with a Neural Network Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

Chapter 7 • Compare Models and Score New Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43

About the Tasks That You Will Perform . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
Compare Models . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
Score New Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Create a Sorted List of Potential Donors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

Appendix 1 • SAS Enterprise Miner Node Reference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

About Nodes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Usage Rules for Nodes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
iv Contents

Appendix 2 • Sample Data Reference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63

Recommended Reading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
Glossary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
 v

About This Book

Audience

This book is intended primarily for users who are new to SAS Enterprise Miner. The
documentation assumes familiarity with graphical user interface (GUI) based software
applications and basic, but not advanced, knowledge of data mining and statistical
modeling principles. Although this knowledge is assumed, users who do not have this
knowledge will still be able to complete the example that is described in this book end-
to-end. In addition, SAS code is displayed in some result windows that are produced
during the course of the example. However, SAS programming knowledge is not
necessary to perform any task outlined in this book.
vi About This Book
 1

Chapter 1

Introduction to SAS Enterprise

Miner 15.2

What Is SAS Enterprise Miner? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

How Does SAS Enterprise Miner Work? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Benefits of Using SAS Enterprise Miner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Accessibility Features of SAS Enterprise Miner 15.2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Overview of Accessibility Features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Exceptions to Standard Keyboard Controls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Other Exceptions to Accessibility Standards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Getting to Know the Graphical User Interface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

What Is SAS Enterprise Miner?

SAS Enterprise Miner streamlines the data mining process to create highly accurate
predictive and descriptive models based on analysis of vast amounts of data from across
an enterprise. Data mining is applicable in a variety of industries and provides
methodologies for such diverse business problems as fraud detection, householding,
customer retention and attrition, database marketing, market segmentation, risk analysis,
affinity analysis, customer satisfaction, bankruptcy prediction, and portfolio analysis.
In SAS Enterprise Miner, the data mining process has the following (SEMMA) steps:
• Sample the data by creating one or more data sets. The sample should be large
enough to contain significant information, yet small enough to process. This step
includes the use of data preparation tools for data import, merge, append, and filter,
as well as statistical sampling techniques.
• Explore the data by searching for relationships, trends, and anomalies in order to
gain understanding and ideas. This step includes the use of tools for statistical
reporting and graphical exploration, variable selection methods, and variable
clustering.
• Modify the data by creating, selecting, and transforming the variables to focus the
model selection process. This step includes the use of tools for defining
transformations, missing value handling, value recoding, and interactive binning.
• Model the data by using the analytical tools to train a statistical or machine learning
model to reliably predict a desired outcome. This step includes the use of techniques
such as linear and logistic regression, decision trees, neural networks, partial least
2 Chapter 1 • Introduction to SAS Enterprise Miner 15.2

squares, LARS and LASSO, nearest neighbor, and importing models defined by
other users or even outside SAS Enterprise Miner.
• Assess the data by evaluating the usefulness and reliability of the findings from the
data mining process. This step includes the use of tools for comparing models and
computing new fit statistics, cutoff analysis, decision support, report generation, and
score code management.
You might or might not include all of the SEMMA steps in an analysis, and it might be
necessary to repeat one or more of the steps several times before you are satisfied with
the results.
After you have completed the SEMMA steps, you can apply a scoring formula from one
or more champion models to new data that might or might not contain the target
variable. Scoring new data that is not available at the time of model training is the goal
of most data mining problems.
Furthermore, advanced visualization tools enable you to quickly and easily examine
large amounts of data in multidimensional histograms and to graphically compare
modeling results.
Scoring new data that is not available at the time of model training is the goal of most
data mining exercises. SAS Enterprise Miner includes tools for generating and testing
complete score code for the entire process flow diagram as SAS Code, C code, and Java
code, as well as tools for interactively scoring new data and examining the results. You
can register your model to a SAS Metadata Server to share your results with users of
applications such as SAS Enterprise Guide and SAS Data Integration Studio that can
integrate the score code into reporting and production processes. SAS Model Manager
complements the data mining process by providing a structure for managing projects
through development, testing, and production environments and is fully integrated with
SAS Enterprise Miner.

How Does SAS Enterprise Miner Work?

In SAS Enterprise Miner, the data mining process is driven by a process flow diagram
that you create by dragging nodes from a toolbar that is organized by SEMMA
categories and dropping them onto a diagram workspace.

Figure 1.1 Example Process Flow Diagram

The graphical user interface (GUI) is designed in such a way that the business analyst
who has little statistical expertise can navigate through the data mining methodology,
and the quantitative expert can explore each node in depth to fine-tune the analytical
process.
SAS Enterprise Miner automates the scoring process and supplies complete scoring code
for all stages of model development in SAS, C, Java, and PMML. The scoring code can
 Accessibility Features of SAS Enterprise Miner 15.2 3

be deployed in a variety of real-time or batch environments within SAS, on the web, or

directly in relational databases.

Benefits of Using SAS Enterprise Miner

The benefits of using SAS Enterprise Miner include the following:
• Support the entire data mining process with a broad set of tools. Regardless of
your data mining preference or skill level, SAS Enterprise Miner is flexible and
addresses complex problems. Going from raw data to accurate, business-driven data
mining models becomes a seamless process, enabling the statistical modeling group,
business managers, and the IT department to collaborate more efficiently.
• Build more models faster with an easy-to-use GUI. The process flow diagram
environment dramatically shortens model development time for both business
analysts and statisticians. SAS Enterprise Miner includes an intuitive user interface
that incorporates common design principles established for SAS software and
additional navigation tools for moving easily around the workspace. The GUI can be
customized for all analysts' needs via flexible, interactive dialog boxes, code editors,
and display settings.
• Enhance accuracy of predictions. Innovative algorithms enhance the stability and
accuracy of predictions, which can be verified easily by visual model assessment and
validation. Both analytical and business users enjoy a common, easy-to-interpret
visual view of the data mining process. The process flow diagrams serve as self-
documenting templates that can be updated easily or applied to new problems
without starting over from scratch.
• Surface business information and easily share results through the unique model
repository. Numerous integrated assessment features enable you to compare results
of different modeling techniques in both statistical and business terms within a
single, easy-to-interpret framework. SAS Enterprise Miner projects support the
collaborative sharing of modeling results among quantitative analysts. Models can
also be imported into the SAS Model Manager repository for sharing with scoring
officers and independent model validation testers.

Accessibility Features of SAS Enterprise Miner

15.2

Overview of Accessibility Features

SAS Enterprise Miner 15.2 includes accessibility and compatibility features that improve
the usability of the product for users with disabilities, with the exceptions noted below.
These features are related to accessibility standards for electronic information
technology that were adopted by the U.S. Government under Section 508 of the U.S.
Rehabilitation Act of 1973, as amended.
SAS Enterprise Miner 15.2 conforms to accessibility standards for the Windows
platform. For specific information about Windows accessibility features, refer to your
operating system's help.
4 Chapter 1 • Introduction to SAS Enterprise Miner 15.2

If you have questions or concerns about the accessibility of SAS products, send email to
[email protected].

Exceptions to Standard Keyboard Controls

SAS Enterprise Miner 15.2 uses the same keyboard shortcuts as other Windows
applications, with these exceptions:
• There is no keyboard equivalent for accessing the Explore window for a data source
via the right-click pop-up menu. However, an alternate control is accessible from the
View menu.
• There are no keyboard equivalents for these actions:
• selecting a SAS Server Directory that is a subdirectory lower in the tree than the
default folders in the Create New Project Wizard
• selecting and editing the value of column attributes in the Data Source Wizard
• maximizing or minimizing the Results window
• accessing the Expression Builder in the Transform Variable node

Other Exceptions to Accessibility Standards

Other exceptions to the accessibility standards described in Section 508 of the U.S.
Rehabilitation Act of 1973 include the following:
• On-screen indication of the current focus is not well-defined in some dialog boxes, in
some menus, and in tables.
• High contrast color schemes are not universally inherited.
• SAS Enterprise Miner 15.2 is not fully accessible to assistive technologies:
• Many controls are not read by JAWS, and the accessible properties of many
controls are not surfaced to the Java Accessibility API.
• Some content in the Data Source Wizard and Library Wizard is not accessible.

Getting to Know the Graphical User Interface

You use the SAS Enterprise Miner GUI to build a process flow diagram that controls
your data mining project.
 Getting to Know the Graphical User Interface 5

Figure 1.2 The SAS Enterprise Miner GUI

1. Toolbar Shortcut Buttons — Use the toolbar shortcut buttons to perform common
computer functions and frequently used SAS Enterprise Miner operations. Move the
mouse pointer over any shortcut button to see the text name. Click a shortcut button
to use it.
2. Project Panel — Use the Project Panel to manage and view data sources, diagrams,
results, and project users.
3. Properties Panel — Use the Properties Panel to view and edit the settings of data
sources, diagrams, nodes, and users.
4. Property Help Panel — The Property Help Panel displays a short description of any
property that you select in the Properties Panel. Extended help can be found from the
Help main menu.
6 Chapter 1 • Introduction to SAS Enterprise Miner 15.2

5. Toolbar — The Toolbar is a graphic set of node icons that you use to build process
flow diagrams in the Diagram Workspace. Drag a node icon into the Diagram
Workspace to use it. The icon remains in place in the Toolbar, and the node in the
Diagram Workspace is ready to be connected and configured for use in the process
flow diagram.
6. Diagram Workspace — Use the Diagram Workspace to build, edit, run, and save
process flow diagrams. In this workspace, you graphically build, order, sequence,
and connect the nodes that you use to mine your data and generate reports.
7. Diagram Navigation Toolbar — Use the Diagram Navigation Toolbar to organize
and navigate the process flow diagram.
TIP The book “Predictive Modeling with SAS Enterprise Miner: Practical Solutions
for Business Applications” provides examples of saving and exporting SAS code and
offers additional discussion about the SAS Enterprise Miner graphical user interface.
 7

Chapter 2

Learning by Example: Building

and Running a Process Flow

About the Scenario in This Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

Prerequisites for This Example . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

About the Scenario in This Book

This book presents a basic data mining example that is intended to familiarize you with
many features of SAS Enterprise Miner. In this example, you learn how to perform tasks
that are required to build and run a process flow in order to solve a particular business
problem. You should follow the chapters and the steps within the chapters in the order in
which they are presented.
For the purpose of the scenario in this book, you are a data analyst at a national
charitable organization. Your organization seeks to use the results of a previous postcard
mail solicitation for donations to better target its next one. In particular, you want to
determine which of the individuals in your mailing database have characteristics similar
to those of your most profitable donors. By soliciting only these people, your
organization can spend less money on the solicitation effort and more money on
charitable concerns.
When you have finished building the process flow diagram as outlined in this example,
the diagram will resemble the one shown below:
8 Chapter 2 • Learning by Example: Building and Running a Process Flow

TIP “Predictive Modeling with SAS Enterprise Miner: Practical Solutions for
Business Applications” provides several additional example process flow diagrams
for you to create and run.

Prerequisites for This Example

In order to re-create this example, you must have access to SAS Enterprise Miner 15.2,
either as a client/server application or as a complete installation on your local machine.
You must also have saved, on the SAS Enterprise Miner server machine, a copy of the
sample data that is used in the example. You can download a ZIP file that contains the
data from http://support.sas.com/documentation/onlinedoc/miner/. Look for the item
named Example data for Getting Started with SAS Enterprise Miner 15.2. For more
 Prerequisites for This Example 9

information about the structure of the sample data, see Sample Data Reference on page
63.
10 Chapter 2 • Learning by Example: Building and Running a Process Flow
 11

Chapter 3

Set Up the Project

About the Tasks That You Will Perform . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Create a New Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Create a Library . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Create a Data Source . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Create a Diagram and Add the Input Data Node . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

About the Tasks That You Will Perform

To perform these tasks, you need to have downloaded and unzipped the example data for
SAS Enterprise Miner 15.2. If you have not, then see “Prerequisites for This Example”
on page 8.
To set up the example project, you will perform the following tasks:
1. You will create a new SAS Enterprise Miner project.
2. You will define a new library that enables SAS Enterprise Miner to access the
sample data.
3. You will define a new data source in the project, which is later used to import the
sample data into a process flow.
4. You will create a new diagram within the project, and you will create the first node
(for the input data source) in the process flow.
The steps in this example are written as if you were completing them in their entirety
during one SAS Enterprise Miner session. However, you can easily complete the steps
over multiple sessions. To return to the example project after you have closed and
reopened SAS Enterprise Miner, click Open Project in the Welcome to Enterprise
Miner window, and navigate to the saved project.

Create a New Project

In SAS Enterprise Miner, you store your work in projects. A project can contain multiple
process flow diagrams and information that pertains to them.
12 Chapter 3 • Set Up the Project

TIP For organizational purposes, it is a good idea to create a separate project for each
major data mining problem that you want to investigate.
To create the project that you will use in this example:
1. Open SAS Enterprise Miner.
2. In the Welcome to Enterprise Miner window, click New Project. The Create New
Project Wizard opens.
3. Proceed through the steps below to complete the wizard. Contact your system
administrator if you need to be granted directory access or if you are unsure about
the details of your site's configuration.
a. Select the logical workspace server to use. Click Next.
b. Enter Getting Started Charitable Giving Example as the Project
Name.
The SAS Server Directory is the directory on the server machine in which SAS
data sets and other files that are generated by the project will be stored. It is
likely that your site is configured in such a way that the default path is
appropriate for this example. Click Next.
c. The SAS Folder Location is the directory on the server machine in which the
project itself will be stored. It is likely that your site is configured in such a way
that the default path is appropriate for the example project that you are about to
create. Click Next.
Note: If you complete this example over multiple sessions, then this is the
location to which you should navigate after you select Open Project in the
Welcome to Enterprise Miner window.
d. Click Finish.

Create a Library
In order to access the sample data sets using SAS Enterprise Miner, you must create a
SAS library to indicate to SAS the location in which they are stored. When you create a
library, you give SAS a shortcut name and pointer to a storage location in your operating
environment where you store SAS files.
To create a new SAS library for the sample data:
1. On the File menu, select New ð Library. The Library Wizard opens.
2. Proceed through the steps below to complete the wizard. Contact your system
administrator if you need to be granted directory access or if you are unsure about
the details of your site's configuration.
a. The Create New Library option button is automatically selected. Click Next.
b. Enter Donor as the Name.
Then enter the Path to the directory on the server machine that contains the
sample data that you downloaded from the web. For example, if the sample data
is located on the desktop of the server machine (denoted by the C drive), then
you could enter C:\Users\<username>\Desktop, where <username> is
your user name on the server machine. Click Next.
c. Click Finish.
 Create a Data Source 13

Create a Data Source

To use sample data that is stored in a SAS data set in a SAS Enterprise Miner project,
you need to define a data source. In SAS Enterprise Miner, a data source stores the
metadata of an input data set.
TIP You can also use input data saved in files (with extensions such as .jmp and .csv)
that are not SAS data sets in a process flow. To import an external file into a process
flow diagram, use the File Import node, which is located on the Sample tab on the
Toolbar.
To create a new data source for the sample data:
1. On the File menu, select New ð Data Source. The Data Source Wizard opens.
2. Proceed through the steps that are outlined in the wizard.
a. SAS Table is automatically selected as the Source. Click Next.
b. Enter DONOR.DONOR_RAW_DATA as the two-level filename of the Table. Click
Next.
c. Click Next.
d. Select the Advanced option button. Click Next.
e. Change the value of Role for the variables to match the description below. Then,
click Next.
• CONTROL_NUMBER should have the Role ID.
• TARGET_B should have the Role Target.
• TARGET_D should have the Role Rejected.
• CLUSTER_CODE should have the Role Rejected.
• All other variables should have the Role Input.
14 Chapter 3 • Set Up the Project

To change an attribute, click the value of that attribute and select from the drop-
down menu that appears.
Note: SAS Enterprise Miner automatically assigns the role Target to any
variable whose name begins with the prefix TARGET_. For more
information about the rules that SAS Enterprise Miner uses to automatically
assign roles, see the SAS Enterprise Miner Help.
f. Select the Yes option button to indicate that you want to build models based on
the values of decisions. Click Next.
• On the Prior Probabilities tab, select the Yes option button to indicate that
you want to enter new prior probabilities. In the Adjusted Prior column of the
table, enter 0.05 for Level 1 and 0.95 for Level 0.

The values in the Prior column reflect the proportions of observations in the
data set for which TARGET_B is equal to 1 and 0 (0.25 and 0.75,
respectively). However, as the business analyst, you know that these
proportions resulted from over-sampling of donors from the 97NK
solicitation. In fact, you know that the true proportion of donors for the
solicitation was closer to 0.05 than 0.25. For this reason, you adjust the prior
probabilities.
• On the Decision Weights tab, the Maximize option button is automatically
selected, which indicates that you want to maximize profit in this analysis.
Enter 14.5 as the Decision 1 weight for Level 1, -0.5 as the Decision 1
weight for Level 0, and 0.0 as the Decision 2 weight for both levels. Click
Next.

In this example, Decision 1 is the decision to mail a solicitation to an

individual. Decision 2 is the decision to not mail a solicitation. If you mail a
solicitation, and the individual does not respond, then your cost is $0.50 (the
price of postage). However, if the individual does respond, then based on the
previous solicitation, you expect to receive a $15.00 donation on average.
Less the $0.50 postage cost, your organization expects $14.50 profit. If you
do not mail a solicitation, you neither incur a cost nor expect a profit. These
numbers are reflected in the decision weights that you entered in the table.
Click Next.
g. In the Data Source Wizard — Create Sample window, you decide whether to
create a sample data set from the entire data source. This example uses the entire
data set, so you need to select No. Click Next.
h. The Role of the data source is automatically selected as Raw. Click Next.
i. Click Finish.
 Create a Diagram and Add the Input Data Node 15

Create a Diagram and Add the Input Data Node

Now that you have created a project and defined the data source, you are ready to begin
building a process flow diagram.
To create a process flow diagram and add the first node:
1. On the File menu, select New ð Diagram.
2. Enter Donations as the Diagram Name, and click OK. An empty diagram opens
in the Diagram Workspace.
3. Select the DONOR_RAW_DATA data source in the Project Panel. Drag it into the
Diagram Workspace; this action creates the input data node.

TIP Refer to “Predictive Modeling with SAS Enterprise Miner: Practical Solutions
for Business Applications” for more examples about creating new projects, creating
data sources, creating diagrams, and adding nodes to your diagram workspace. The
book also discusses your metadata options.
16 Chapter 3 • Set Up the Project
 17

Chapter 4

Explore the Data and Replace

Input Values

About the Tasks That You Will Perform . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Generate Descriptive Statistics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Partition the Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
Replace Missing Values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

About the Tasks That You Will Perform

You have already set up the project and defined the input data source that you will use in
this example. Now, you will import the data and perform the following tasks, which help
you learn properties of the input data and prepare it for subsequent modeling:
1. You will explore the statistical properties of the variables in the input data set. The
results that are generated in this step will give you an idea of which variables are
most useful in predicting the target response (whether a person donates or not) in this
data set.
2. You will partition the data into two data sets, a training data set and a validation data
set. Such partitioning is common practice in data mining and enables you to develop
a complete model that is not overfitted to a particular set of data.
3. You will specify how SAS Enterprise Miner should handle missing values of
predictor variables.
TIP It is always a good idea to plot the input data and to check it for missing values
before you proceed to model building. Knowing the statistical properties of your
input data is essential for building an accurate and robust predictive model.

Generate Descriptive Statistics

To use the StatExplore node to produce a statistical summary of the input data:
1. Select the Explore tab on the Toolbar.
2. Select the StatExplore node icon. Drag the node into the Diagram Workspace.
18 Chapter 4 • Explore the Data and Replace Input Values

TIP To determine which node an icon represents, position the mouse pointer over
the icon and read the tooltip.
3. Connect the DONOR_RAW_DATA input data source node to the StatExplore node.
To connect the two nodes, position the mouse pointer over the right edge of the input
data source node until the pointer becomes a pencil. With the left mouse button held
down, drag the pencil to the left edge of the StatExplore node. Then, release the
mouse button. An arrow between the two nodes indicates a successful connection.

4. Select the StatExplore node. In the Properties Panel, scroll down to view the Chi-
Square Statistics properties group. Click the value of Interval Variables and select
Yes from the drop-down menu that appears.
Chi-square statistics are always computed for categorical variables. Changing the
selection for interval variables causes SAS Enterprise Miner to distribute interval
variables into five (by default) bins and compute chi-square statistics for the binned
variables when you run the node.

5. In the Diagram Workspace, right-click the StatExplore node, and select Run from
the resulting menu. Click Yes in the Confirmation window that opens.
When you run a node, all of the nodes preceding it in the process flow are also run in
order, beginning with the first node that has changed since the flow was last run. If
no nodes other than the one that you select have changed since the last run, then only
the node that you select is run. You can watch the icons in the process flow diagram
to monitor the status of execution.
• Nodes that are outlined in green are currently running.
• Nodes that are denoted with a check mark inside a green circle have successfully
run.
• Nodes that are outlined in red have failed to run due to errors.
In this example, the DONOR_RAW_DATA input data node had not yet been run.
Therefore, both nodes are run when you select to run the StatExplore node.
6. In the window that appears when processing completes, click Results. The Results
window appears.
 Generate Descriptive Statistics 19

Note: Panels in Results windows might not have the same arrangement on your
screen, due to window resizing. When the Results window is resized, SAS
Enterprise Miner redistributes panels for optimal viewing.
The results window displays the following:
• a plot that orders the variables by their worth in predicting the target variable.
Note: In the StatExplore node, SAS Enterprise Miner calculates variable worth
using the Gini split worth statistic that would be generated by building a
decision tree of depth 1. For detailed information about Gini split worth, see
the SAS Enterprise Miner Help.
• the SAS output from the node.
• a plot that orders the top 20 variables by their chi-square statistics. You can also
choose to view the top 20 variables ordered by their Cramer's V statistics on this
plot.
TIP In SAS Enterprise Miner, you can select graphs, tables, and rows within
tables and select Copy from the right-click pop-up menu to copy these items for
subsequent pasting in other applications such as Microsoft Word and Microsoft
Excel.
7. Expand the Output window, and then scroll to the Class Variable Summary
Statistics and the Interval Variable Summary Statistics sections of the output.
• Notice that there are two class variables and two interval variables for which
there are missing values. Later in the example, you will impute values to use in
the place of missing values for these variables.
• Notice that several variables have relatively large standard deviations. Later in
the example, you will plot the data and explore transformations that can reduce
the variances of these variables.
20 Chapter 4 • Explore the Data and Replace Input Values

8. Close the Results window.

Partition the Data

In data mining, a strategy for assessing the quality of model generalization is to partition
the data source. A portion of the data, called the training data set, is used for preliminary
model fitting. The rest is reserved for empirical validation and is often split into two
parts: validation data and test data. The validation data set is used to prevent a modeling
node from overfitting the training data and to compare models. The test data set is used
for a final assessment of the model.
Note: In SAS Enterprise Miner, the default data partitioning method for class target
variables is to stratify on the target variable or variables. This method is appropriate
for this sample data because there is a large number of non-donors in the input data
relative to the number of donors. Stratifying ensures that both non-donors and donors
are well-represented in the data partitions.
To use the Data Partition node to partition the input data into training and validation sets:
1. Select the Sample tab on the Toolbar.
2. Select the Data Partition node icon. Drag the node into the Diagram Workspace.
3. Connect the StatExplore node to the Data Partition node.

4. Select the Data Partition node. In the Properties Panel, scroll down to view the Data
Set Allocations in the Train properties.
• Click the value of Training, and enter 55.0
• Click the value of Validation, and enter 45.0
• Click the value of Test, and enter 0.0
These properties define the percentage of input data that is used in each type of
mining data set. In this example, you use a training data set and a validation data set,
but you do not use a test data set.
5. In the Diagram Workspace, right-click the Data Partition node, and select Run from
the resulting menu. Click Yes in the Confirmation window that opens.
6. In the window that appears when processing completes, click OK.
 Replace Missing Values 21

Replace Missing Values

In this example, the variables SES and URBANICITY are class variables for which the
value ? denotes a missing value. Because a question mark does not denote a missing
value in the terms that SAS defines a missing value (that is, a blank or a period), SAS
Enterprise Miner sees it as an additional level of a class variable. However, the
knowledge that these values are missing will be useful later in the model-building
process.
To use the Replacement node to interactively specify that such observations of these
variables are missing:
1. Select the Modify tab on the Toolbar.
2. Select the Replacement node icon. Drag the node into the Diagram Workspace.
3. Connect the Data Partition node to the Replacement node.

4. Select the Replacement node. In the Properties Panel, scroll down to view the Train
properties.
a. For Interval Variables, click the value of Default Limits Method, and select
None from the drop-down menu. This selection indicates that no values of
interval variables should be replaced. With the default selection, a particular
range for the values of each interval variable would have been enforced. In this
example, you do not want to enforce such a range.
Note: In this data set, all missing interval variable values are correctly coded as
SAS missing values (a blank or a period).
b. For Class Variables, click the ellipses that represent the value of Replacement
Editor. The Replacement Editor opens.
• Notice that SES and URBANICITY both have a level that contains
observations with the value ?. For these two variables, this level represents
observations with missing values. Enter _MISSING_ as the Replacement
Value for the two rows, as shown in the following image. This action enables
SAS Enterprise Miner to recognize that the question marks indicate missing
values for these two variables. Later, you will impute values for observations
with missing values.
22 Chapter 4 • Explore the Data and Replace Input Values

• Enter _UNKNOWN_ as the Replacement Value for the level of

DONOR_GENDER that has the value A. This value is the result of a data
entry error, and you do not know whether the intention was to code it as an F
or an M.
Click OK.
5. In the Diagram Workspace, right-click the Replacement node, and select Run from
the resulting menu. Click Yes in the Confirmation window that opens.
6. In the window that appears when processing completes, click OK.

In the data that is exported from the Replacement node, a new variable is created for
each variable that is replaced (in this example, SES, URBANICITY, and
DONOR_GENDER). The original variable is not overwritten. Instead, the new variable
has the same name as the original variable but is prefaced with REP_. The original
version of each variable also exists in the exported data and has the role Rejected.
To view the data that is exported by a node, click the ellipsis button that represents the
value of the General property Exported Data in the Properties Panel. To view the
exported variables, click Properties in the window that opens, and then view the
Variables tab. Similarly, you can view the data that is imported and used by a node by
clicking the ellipsis button that represents the value of the General property Imported
Data in the Properties Panel.
TIP “Predictive Modeling with SAS Enterprise Miner: Practical Solutions for
Business Applications” provides examples of and options for the StatExplore and
Replacement nodes. The book also discusses alternate configurations for the Data
Partition node.
 23

Chapter 5

Build Decision Trees

About the Tasks That You Will Perform . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Automatically Train and Prune a Decision Tree . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Interactively Train a Decision Tree . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Create a Gradient Boosting Model of the Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

About the Tasks That You Will Perform

Now that you have verified the input data, it is time to build predictive models. You
perform the following tasks to model the input data using nonparametric decision trees:
1. You enable SAS Enterprise Miner to automatically train a full decision tree and to
automatically prune the tree to an optimal size. When training the tree, you select
split rules at each step to maximize the split decision logworth. Split decision
logworth is a statistic that measures the effectiveness of a particular split decision at
differentiating values of the target variable. For more information about logworth,
see the SAS Enterprise Miner Help.
2. You interactively train a decision tree. At each step, you select from a list of
candidate rules to define the split rule that you deem to be the best.
3. You use a Gradient Boosting node to generate a set of decision trees that form a
single predictive model. Gradient boosting is a boosting approach that re-samples the
analysis data set several times to generate results that form a weighted average of the
re-sampled data set.

Automatically Train and Prune a Decision Tree

Decision tree models are advantageous because they are conceptually easy to
understand, yet they readily accommodate nonlinear associations between input
variables and one or more target variables. They also handle missing values without the
need for imputation. Therefore, you decide to first model the data using decision trees.
You will compare decision tree models to other models later in the example.
However, before you add and run the Decision Tree node, you will add a Control Point
node. The Control Point node is used to simplify a process flow diagram by reducing the
24 Chapter 5 • Build Decision Trees

number of connections between multiple interconnected nodes. By the end of this

example, you will have created five different models of the input data set, and two
Control Point nodes to connect these nodes. The first Control Point node, added here,
will distribute the input data to each of these models. The second Control Point node will
collect the models and send them to evaluation nodes.
To use the Control Point node:
1. Select the Utility tab on the Toolbar.
2. Select the Control Point node icon. Drag the node into the Diagram Workspace.
3. Connect the Replacement node to the Control Point node.

SAS Enterprise Miner enables you to build a decision tree in two ways: automatically
and interactively. You will begin by letting SAS Enterprise Miner automatically train and
prune a tree.
To use the Decision Tree node to automatically train and prune a decision tree:
1. Select the Model tab on the Toolbar.
2. Select the Decision Tree node icon. Drag the node into the Diagram Workspace.
3. Connect the Control Point node to the Decision Tree node.

4. Select the Decision Tree node. In the Properties Panel, scroll down to view the
Train properties:
• Click the value of the Maximum Depth Splitting Rule property, and enter 10.
This specification enables SAS Enterprise Miner to train a tree that includes up to
ten generations of the root node. However, the final tree in this example will have
fewer generations due to pruning.
• Click the value of the Leaf Size Node property, and enter 8. This specification
constrains the minimum number of training observations to eight in any leaf.
 Automatically Train and Prune a Decision Tree 25

• Click the value of the Number of Surrogate Rules Node property, and enter 4.
This specification enables SAS Enterprise Miner to use up to four surrogate rules
in each non-leaf node if the main splitting rule relies on an input whose value is
missing.
Note: The Assessment Measure Subtree property is automatically set to Decision
because of the profit matrix that you defined in “Create a Data Source” on page
13. Accordingly, the Decision Tree node will build a tree that maximizes profit in
the validation data.
5. In the Diagram Workspace, right-click the Decision Tree node, and select Run from
the resulting menu. Click Yes in the Confirmation window that opens.
6. In the window that appears when processing completes, click Results. The Results
window appears.
a. On the View menu, select Model ð Node Rules. The English Rules window
appears.
b. Expand the Node Rules window. This window contains the IF-THEN logic that
distributes observations into each leaf node of the decision tree.

In the Output window, the Tree Leaf Report indicates that there are seven leaf
nodes in this tree. For each leaf node, the following information is listed:
• node ID
• node depth
• number of training observations in the node
• percentage of training observations in the node with TARGET_B=1 (did
donate), adjusted for prior probabilities
This tree has been automatically pruned to an optimal size. Therefore, the node
numbers that appear in the final tree are not sequential. In fact, they reflect the
positions of the nodes in the full tree, before pruning.
7. Close the Results window.
26 Chapter 5 • Build Decision Trees

Interactively Train a Decision Tree

To use the Decision Tree node to interactively train and prune a decision tree:
1. From the Model tab on the Toolbar, select the Decision Tree node icon. Drag the
node into the Diagram Workspace.
2. In the Diagram Workspace, right-click the Decision Tree node, and select Rename
from the resulting menu. Enter Interactive Decision Tree and then click
OK in the window that opens.
3. Connect the Control Point node to the Interactive Decision Tree node.

4. Select the Interactive Decision Tree node. In the Properties Panel, in the Train
properties group, click the ellipses that represent the value of Interactive. The
Interactive Decision Tree window appears.
a. Select the root node (at this point, the only node in the tree), and then from the
Action menu, select Split Node. The Split Node window appears that lists the
candidate splitting rules ranked by logworth (-Log(p)). The
FREQUENCY_STATUS_97NK rule has the highest logworth. Ensure that this
row is selected, and click OK.
 Interactively Train a Decision Tree 27

b. The tree now has two additional nodes. Select the lower left node (where
FREQUENCY_STATUS_97NK is 3 or 4), and then from the Action menu,
select Split Node. In the Split Node window that opens, select
MONTHS_SINCE_LAST_GIFT, which ranks second in logworth, and click
Edit Rule to manually specify the split point for this rule. The Interval Split Rule
window appears.
Enter 8 as the New split point, and click Add Branch. Then, select Branch 3
(>= 8.5) and click Remove Branch. Click OK.
28 Chapter 5 • Build Decision Trees

Ensure that MONTHS_SINCE_LAST_GIFT is selected in the Split Node

window, and click OK.
c. Select the first generation node that you have not yet split (where
FREQUENCY_STATUS_97NK is 1, 2, or Missing). From the Action menu,
select Split Node. In the Split Node window that opens, ensure that PEP_STAR
is selected, and click OK.
The tree now has seven nodes, four of which are leaf nodes. The nodes are
colored from light to dark, corresponding to low to high percentages of correctly
classified observations.

d. Select the lower right node (where FREQUENCY_STATUS_97NK is 1, 2, or

Missing and PEP_STAR is 0 or Missing). From the Action menu, select Train
Node. This selection causes SAS Enterprise Miner to continue adding
 Create a Gradient Boosting Model of the Data 29

generations of this node until a stopping criterion is met. For more information
about stopping criteria for decision trees, see the SAS Enterprise Miner Help.
Note: In the Interactive Decision Tree window, you can prune decision trees.
However, in this example, you will leave the tree in its current state.
e. Close the Interactive Decision Tree window.

Create a Gradient Boosting Model of the Data

The Gradient Boosting node uses a partitioning algorithm to search for an optimal
partition of the data for a single target variable. Gradient boosting is an approach that
resamples the analysis data several times to generate results that form a weighted
average of the resampled data set. Tree boosting creates a series of decision trees that
form a single predictive model.
Like decision trees, boosting makes no assumptions about the distribution of the data.
Boosting is less prone to overfit the data than a single decision tree. If a decision tree fits
the data fairly well, then boosting often improves the fit. For more information about the
Gradient Boosting node, see the SAS Enterprise Miner help documentation.
To create a gradient boosting model of the data:
1. Select the Model tab on the Toolbar.
2. Select the Gradient Boosting node icon. Drag the node into the Diagram
Workspace.
3. Connect the Control Point node to the Gradient Boosting node.

4. Select the Gradient Boosting node. In the Properties Panel, set the following
properties:
30 Chapter 5 • Build Decision Trees

• Click the value for the Maximum Depth property, in the Splitting Rule
subgroup, and enter 10. This property determines the number of generations in
each decision tree created by the Gradient Boosting node.
• Click the value for the Number of Surrogate Rules property, in the Node
subgroup, and enter 2. Surrogate rules are backup rules that are used in the event
of missing data. For example, if your primary splitting rule sorts donors based on
their ZIP codes, then a reasonable surrogate rule would sort based on the donor’s
city of residence.
5. In the Diagram Workspace, right-click the Gradient Boosting node, and select Run
from the resulting menu. Click Yes in the Confirmation window that opens.
6. In the Run Status window, select OK.

TIP The book “Decision Trees for Analytics Using SAS Enterprise Miner” offers
additional information about alternative measures of the effectiveness of a split,
options for training and pruning, suggestions for guiding tree growth, and examples
of multiple tree and gradient boosting models.
TIP “Predictive Modeling with SAS Enterprise Miner: Practical Solutions for
Business Applications” offers examples that automatically and interactively train and
prune decision tree models and examples that create gradient boosting models.
 31

Chapter 6

Impute and Transform, Build

Neural Networks, and Build a
Regression Model

About the Tasks That You Will Perform . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Impute Missing Values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Transform Variables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Analyze with a Logistic Regression Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
Analyze with a Neural Network Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

About the Tasks That You Will Perform

You have just modeled the input data using decision trees, which are nonparametric. As
part of your analysis, you now perform the following tasks in order to also model the
data using parametric methods:
1. You impute values to use as replacements for missing values that are in the input
data. Regressions and neural networks would otherwise ignore missing values, which
would decrease the amount of data that you use in the models and lower their
predictive power.
2. You transform input variables to make the usual assumptions of regression more
appropriate for the input data.
3. You model the input data using logistic regression, a statistical method with which
your management is familiar.
4. You model the input data using neural networks, which are more flexible than
logistic regression (and more complicated).

Impute Missing Values

For decision trees, missing values are not problematic. Surrogate splitting rules enable
you to use the values of other input variables to perform a split for observations with
missing values. In SAS Enterprise Miner, however, models such as regressions and
neural networks ignore altogether observations that contain missing values, which
reduces the size of the training data set. Less training data can substantially weaken the
32 Chapter 6 • Impute and Transform, Build Neural Networks, and Build a Regression Model

predictive power of these models. To overcome this obstacle of missing data, you can
impute missing values before you fit the models.
TIP It is a particularly good idea to impute missing values before fitting a model that
ignores observations with missing values if you plan to compare those models with a
decision tree. Model comparison is most appropriate between models that are fit with
the same set of observations.
To use the Impute node to impute missing values:
1. Select the Modify tab on the Toolbar.
2. Select the Impute node icon. Drag the node into the Diagram Workspace.
3. Connect the Control Point node to the Impute node.

4. Select the Impute node. In the Properties Panel, scroll down to view the Train
properties:
• For Class Variables, click the value of Default Input Method and select Tree
Surrogate from the drop-down menu.
• For Interval Variables, click the value of Default Input Method and select
Median from the drop-down menu.
The default input method specifies which default statistic to use to impute missing
values. In this example, the values of missing interval variables are replaced by the
median of the nonmissing values. This statistic is less sensitive to extreme values
than the mean or midrange and is therefore useful for imputation of missing values
from skewed distributions. The values of missing class variables, in this example, are
imputed using predicted values from a decision tree. For each class variable, SAS
Enterprise Miner builds a decision tree (in this case, potentially using surrogate
splitting rules) with that variable as the target and the other input variables as
predictors.
5. In the Diagram Workspace, right-click the Impute node, and select Run from the
resulting menu. Click Yes in the Confirmation window that opens.
6. In the window that appears when processing completes, click OK.
 Transform Variables 33

Note: In the data that is exported from the Impute node, a new variable is created for
each variable for which missing values are imputed. The original variable is not
overwritten. Instead, the new variable has the same name as the original variable but
is prefaced with IMP_. The original version of each variable also exists in the
exported data and has the role Rejected. In this example, SES and URBANICITY
have values that are replaced and then imputed. Therefore, in addition to the original
version, each of these variables has a version in the exported data that is prefaced by
IMP_REP_.

Transform Variables
Sometimes, input data is more informative on a scale other than that from which it was
originally collected. For example, variable transformations can be used to stabilize
variance, remove nonlinearity, improve additivity, and counter non-normality. Therefore,
for many models, transformations of the input data (either dependent or independent
variables) can lead to a better model fit. These transformations can be functions of either
a single variable or of more than one variable.
To use the Transform Variables node to make variables better suited for logistic
regression models and neural networks:
1. From the Modify tab on the Toolbar, select the Transform Variables node icon.
Drag the node into the Diagram Workspace.
2. Connect the Impute node to the Transform Variables node.

TIP To align a process flow diagram vertically, as in the image above, right-click
anywhere in the Diagram Workspace, and select Layout ð Vertically from the
resulting menu.
34 Chapter 6 • Impute and Transform, Build Neural Networks, and Build a Regression Model

3. Select the Transform Variables node. In the Properties Panel, scroll down to view
the Train properties, and click the ellipses that represent the value of Formulas. The
Formulas window appears.

a. In the variables table, click the Role column heading to sort the variables in
ascending order by their role.
b. You can select any row in the variable table to display the histogram of a variable
in the panel above. Look at the histograms for all variables that have the role
Input. Notice that several variables have skewed distributions.
c. Close the Formulas window.
4. In the Properties Panel, scroll down to view the Train properties, and click the
ellipses that represent the value of Variables. The Variables — Trans window
appears.
a. The common log transformation is often used to control skewness. Select the
transformation Method for the following interval variables and select Log 10
from the drop-down menu that appears:
 Analyze with a Logistic Regression Model 35

• FILE_AVG_GIFT
• LAST_GIFT_AMT
• LIFETIME_AVG_GIFT_AMT
• LIFETIME_GIFT_AMOUNT
TIP You can hold down the Ctrl key to select multiple rows. Then, when you
select a new Method for one of the selected variables, the new method will
apply to all of the selected variables.
b. Select the transformation Method for the following interval variables and select
Optimal Binning from the drop-down menu that appears:
• LIFETIME_CARD_PROM
• LIFETIME_GIFT_COUNT
• MEDIAN_HOME_VALUE
• MEDIAN_HOUSEHOLD_INCOME
• PER_CAPITA_INCOME
• RECENT_RESPONSE_PROP
• RECENT_STAR_STATUS
The optimal binning transformation is useful when there is a nonlinear
relationship between an input variable and the target. For more information about
this transformation, see the SAS Enterprise Miner Help.
c. Click OK.
5. In the Diagram Workspace, right-click the Transform Variables node, and select Run
from the resulting menu. Click Yes in the Confirmation window that opens.
6. In the window that appears when processing completes, click OK.

Note: In the data that is exported from the Transform Variables node, a new variable is
created for each variable that is transformed. The original variable is not overwritten.
Instead, the new variable has the same name as the original variable but is prefaced
with an identifier of the transformation. For example, variables to which the log
transformation have been applied are prefaced with LOG_, and variables to which
the optimal binning transformation have been applied are prefaced with OPT_. The
original version of each variable also exists in the exported data and has the role
Rejected.

Analyze with a Logistic Regression Model

As part of your analysis, you want to include some parametric models for comparison
with the decision trees that you built in Chapter 5, “Build Decision Trees,” on page 23.
Because it is familiar to the management of your organization, you have decided to
include a logistic regression as one of the parametric models.
To use the Regression node to fit a logistic regression model:
1. Select the Model tab on the Toolbar.
2. Select the Regression node icon. Drag the node into the Diagram Workspace.
3. Connect the Transform Variables node to the Regression node.
36 Chapter 6 • Impute and Transform, Build Neural Networks, and Build a Regression Model

4. To examine histograms of the imputed and transformed input variables, right-click

the Regression node and select Update. In the diagram workspace, select the
Regression node. In the Properties Panel, scroll down to view the Train properties,
and click the ellipses that represent the value of Variables. The Variables — Reg
window appears.
a. Select all variables that have the prefix LG10_. Click Explore. The Explore
window appears.
 Analyze with a Logistic Regression Model 37

You can select a bar in any histogram, and the observations that are in that bucket
are highlighted in the EMWS.Trans_TRAIN data set window and in the other
histograms. Close the Explore window to return to the Variables — Reg window.
b. (Optional) You can explore the histograms of other input variables.
c. Close the Variables — Reg window.
5. In the Properties Panel, scroll down to view the Train properties. Click the Selection
Model property in the Model Selection subgroup, and select Stepwise from the
drop-down menu that appears. This specification causes SAS Enterprise Miner to use
stepwise variable selection to build the logistic regression model.
Note: The Regression node automatically performs logistic regression if the target
variable is a class variable that takes one of two values. If the target variable is a
continuous variable, then the Regression node performs linear regression.
6. In the Diagram Workspace, right-click the Regression node, and select Run from the
resulting menu. Click Yes in the Confirmation window that opens.
7. In the window that appears when processing completes, click Results. The Results
window appears.
8. Maximize the Output window. This window describes the variable selection process.
Lines 1708–1729 show a summary of the steps that were taken.
9. Minimize the Output window and maximize the Score Rankings Overlay window.
From the drop-down menu, select Cumulative Total Expected Profit.
38 Chapter 6 • Impute and Transform, Build Neural Networks, and Build a Regression Model

The data that is used to construct this plot is ordered by expected profit. For this
example, you have defined a profit matrix. Therefore, expected profit is a function of
both the probability of donation for an individual and the profit associated with the
corresponding outcome. A value is computed for each decision from the sum of the
decision matrix values multiplied by the classification probabilities and minus any
defined cost. The decision with the greatest value is selected, and the value of that
selected decision for each observation is used to compute overall profit measures.
The plot represents the cumulative total expected profit that results from soliciting
the best n% of the individuals (as determined by expected profit) on your mailing
list. For example, if you were to solicit the best 40% of the individuals, the total
expected profit from the validation data would be approximately $1850. If you were
to solicit everyone on the list, then based on the training data, you could expect
approximately $2250 profit on the campaign.
10. Close the Results window.

Analyze with a Neural Network Model

Neural networks are a class of parametric models that can accommodate a wider variety
of nonlinear relationships between a set of predictors and a target variable than can
logistic regression. Building a neural network model involves two main phases. First,
you must define the network configuration. You can think of this step as defining the
structure of the model that you want to use. Then, you iteratively train the model.
A neural network model will be more complicated to explain to the management of your
organization than a regression or a decision tree. However, you know that the
management would prefer a stronger predictive model, even if it is more complicated.
So, you decide to run a neural network model, which you will compare to the other
models later in the example.
 Analyze with a Neural Network Model 39

Because neural networks are so flexible, SAS Enterprise Miner has two nodes that fit
neural network models: the Neural Network node and the AutoNeural node. The Neural
Network node trains a specific neural network configuration; this node is best used when
you know a lot about the structure of the model that you want to define. The AutoNeural
node searches over several network configurations to find one that best describes the
relationship in a data set and then trains that network.
This example does not use the AutoNeural node. However, you are encouraged to
explore the features of this node on your own.
Before creating a neural network, you will reduce the number of input variables with the
Variable Selection node. Performing variable selection reduces the number of input
variables and saves computer resources. To use the Variable Selection node to reduce the
number of input variables that are used in a neural network:
1. Select the Explore tab on the Toolbar.
2. Select the Variable Selection node icon. Drag the node into the Diagram Workspace.
3. Connect the Transform Variables node to the Variable Selection node.

4. In the Diagram Workspace, right-click the Variable Selection node, and select Run
from the resulting menu. Click Yes in the Confirmation window that opens.
5. In the window that appears when processing completes, click Results. The Results
window appears.
6. Expand the Variable Selection window.
40 Chapter 6 • Impute and Transform, Build Neural Networks, and Build a Regression Model

Examine the table to see which variables were selected. The role for variables that
were not selected has been changed to Rejected. Close the Results window.
Note: In this example, for variable selection, a forward stepwise least squares
regression method was used. It maximizes the model R-square value. For more
information about this method, see the SAS Enterprise Miner Help.
7. Close the Results window.

The input data is now ready to be modeled with a neural network. To use the Neural
Network node to train a specific neural network configuration:
1. From the Model tab on the Toolbar, select the Neural Network node icon. Drag the
node into the Diagram Workspace.
2. Connect the Variable Selection node to the Neural Network node.
 Analyze with a Neural Network Model 41

3. Select the Neural Network node. In the Properties Panel, scroll down to view the
Train properties, and click the ellipses that represent the value of Network. The
Network window appears. For more information about neural networks, connections,
and hidden units, see the Neural Network Node: Reference documentation in SAS
Enterprise Miner help.
Change the following properties:
• Click the value of Direct Connection and select Yes from the drop-down menu
that appears. This selection enables the network to have connections directly
between the inputs and the outputs in addition to connections via the hidden
units.
• Click the value of Number of Hidden Units and enter 5. This example trains a
multilayer perceptron neural network with five units on the hidden layer.
Click OK.
4. In the Diagram Workspace, right-click the Neural Network node, and select Run
from the resulting menu. Click Yes in the Confirmation window that opens.
5. In the window that appears when processing completes, click Results. The Results
window appears. Maximize the Score Rankings Overlay window. From the drop-
down menu, select Cumulative Total Expected Profit.
42 Chapter 6 • Impute and Transform, Build Neural Networks, and Build a Regression Model

Compare these results to those from the Regression node. According to this model, if
you were to solicit the best 40% of the individuals, the total expected profit from the
validation data would be approximately $1900. If you were to solicit everyone on the
list, then based on the training data, you could expect approximately $2300 profit on
the campaign.
6. Close the Results window.

TIP See “Predictive Modeling with SAS Enterprise Miner: Practical Solutions for
Business Applications” for examples that use the Impute, Transform Variables, and
Neural Network nodes, as well as a business application of a logistic regression
model.
 43

Chapter 7

Compare Models and Score

New Data

About the Tasks That You Will Perform . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43

Compare Models . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
Score New Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Create a Sorted List of Potential Donors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

About the Tasks That You Will Perform

Now that you have five candidate models to use to predict the best target individuals for
your mail solicitation, you can compare them to determine a champion model that you
will use to score new data. You perform the following tasks in order to determine which
of the individuals in your organization's database to solicit:
1. You compare models and select a champion model that, according to an evaluation
criterion, performs best in the validation data.
2. You create a new data source for a data set that contains scoring data that has not
been used to build any of the models thus far in the process flow and that does not
include values of the target variable. You score this data using the champion model.
3. You write SAS code to output, based on the scored data, a list of the top potential
donors according to the probability of donating and the profitability matrix that you
defined in “Create a Data Source” on page 13.

Compare Models
To use the Model Comparison node to compare the models that you have built in this
example and to select one as the champion model:
1. Select the Utility tab on the Toolbar.
2. Select the Control Point node icon. Drag the node into the Diagram Workspace.
3. Connect all five model nodes to the Control Point node.
44 Chapter 7 • Compare Models and Score New Data

TIP Control Point nodes enable you to better organize your process flow diagram.
These nodes do not perform calculations; they simply pass data from preceding
nodes to subsequent nodes.
4. Select the Assess tab on the Toolbar.
5. Select the Model Comparison node icon. Drag the node into the Diagram
Workspace.
6. Connect the Control Point node to the Model Comparison node.

7. In the Diagram Workspace, right-click the Model Comparison node, and select Run
from the resulting menu. Click Yes in the Confirmation window that opens.
8. In the window that appears when processing completes, click Results. The Results
window appears.
9. In the Fit Statistics window, notice that the Regression model was selected as the
champion model. The champion model has the value Y in the Selected Model
column in the Fit Statistics window.
In the Model Comparison node, SAS Enterprise Miner selects the champion model
based on the value of a single statistic. You can specify which statistic to use for
selection in the node Properties Panel. Because you did not change the value of this
property, the default statistic was used, which (because a profit matrix is defined) is
the average profit in the validation data.
 Score New Data 45

10. Close the Results window.

Score New Data

To create a new data source for the sample data that you will score:
1. On the File menu, select New ð Data Source. The Data Source Wizard opens.
2. Proceed through the steps that are outlined in the wizard.
a. SAS Table is automatically selected as the Source. Click Next.
b. Enter DONOR.DONOR_SCORE_DATA as the two-level filename of the Table.
Click Next.
c. Click Next.
d. The Basic option is automatically selected. Click Next.
e. Click Next.
f. The No option is automatically selected. Click Next.
g. Select Score as the Role of the data source, and click Next.
h. Click Finish.

3. Select the DONOR_SCORE_DATA data source in the Project Panel. Drag it into the
Diagram Workspace.

To use the Score node to score new data:

1. Select the Assess tab on the Toolbar.
2. Select the Score node icon. Drag the node into the Diagram Workspace.
3. Connect the Model Comparison node and the DONOR_SCORE_DATA data source
node to the Score node.
46 Chapter 7 • Compare Models and Score New Data

4. In the Diagram Workspace, right-click the Score node, and select Run from the
resulting menu. Click Yes in the Confirmation window that opens.
5. In the window that appears when processing completes, click OK. The scoring code
has been generated, and the scoring data has been scored.
Note: The SAS scoring code is viewable in the node results.

Create a Sorted List of Potential Donors

To use the SAS Code node to create a list of best potential donors:
1. Select the Utility tab on the Toolbar.
2. Select the SAS Code node icon. Drag the node into the Diagram Workspace.
3. Connect the Score node to the SAS Code node.
 Create a Sorted List of Potential Donors 47

4. Select the SAS Code node. In the Properties Panel, scroll down to view the Train
properties, and click the ellipses that represent the value of Code Editor. The
Training Code — Code Node window appears.
a. In the Training Code box, enter the following SAS code, where <LIBREF> is
the libref of the diagram:
proc sort data= <LIBREF>.Score_SCORE out= bestlist;
by descending ep_target_b;
run;

proc print data= bestlist;

var control_number ep_target_b;
run;

TIP To determine the libref of the diagram, select the diagram in the Project
Panel and then view the diagram ID in the Properties Panel. The diagram ID
is the libref that you should use.
b. On the File menu, select Save All. Then, close the window.
48 Chapter 7 • Compare Models and Score New Data

5. In the Diagram Workspace, right-click the SAS Code node, and select Run from the
resulting menu. Click Yes in the Confirmation window that opens. In the Run Status
window, click Results. The Results window appears in which you can view the
scored list of potential donors sorted by expected profit.
6. Close the Results window.

TIP “Predictive Modeling with SAS Enterprise Miner: Practical Solutions for
Business Applications” offers comparisons and combinations of different models, as
well as examples of scoring new data.
 49

Appendix 1

SAS Enterprise Miner Node

Reference

About Nodes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Usage Rules for Nodes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62

About Nodes
Most SAS Enterprise Miner nodes are organized on tabs according to the SEMMA data
mining methodology. There are also tabs for Utility, Credit Scoring, HPDM (High
Performance Data Mining), Applications, Text Mining, and Time Series node groups.
Use the Utility nodes to submit SAS programming statements and to define control
points in the process flow diagram. Use the Credit Scoring nodes to score data models
and to create freestanding code. Use the HPDM nodes to use a distributed computing
environment for data processing and analysis. Use the Applications nodes for
incremental response and survival analysis. Use the Text Mining nodes to analyze terms
in text documents. Use the Time Series nodes to perform time series analysis on
timestamped data.
Note: The Credit Scoring, HPDM, and Text Mining nodes do not appear in all installed
versions of SAS Enterprise Miner. Separate licenses are required.

Table A1.1 Sample Nodes

Node Name Description

Append Use the Append node to append data sets that are exported by two different
paths in a single process flow diagram. The Append node can also append
train, validation, and test data sets into a new training data set.

Data Partition Use the Data Partition node to partition an input data set into a training,
test, and validation data set. The training data set is used for preliminary
model fitting. The validation data set is used to monitor and tune the free
model parameters during estimation. It is also used for model assessment.
The test data set is an additional holdout data set that you can use for
model assessment.
50 Appendix 1 • SAS Enterprise Miner Node Reference

Node Name Description

File Import Use the File Import node to convert selected external flat files,
spreadsheets, and database tables into a format that SAS Enterprise Miner
recognizes as a data source and can use in data mining process flow
diagrams.

Filter Use the Filter node to create and apply filters to the input data. You can use
filters to exclude certain observations, such as extreme outliers and errant
data that you do not want to include in a mining analysis.

Input Data The Input Data node represents the data source that you choose for a
mining analysis. It provides details (metadata) about the variables in the
data source that you want to use.

Merge Use the Merge node to merge observations from two or more data sets into
a single observation in a new data set.

Sample Use the Sample node to extract a simple random sample, nth-observation
sample, stratified sample, first-n sample, or cluster sample of an input data
set. Sampling is recommended for extremely large databases because it can
significantly decrease model training time. If the random sample
sufficiently represents the source data set, then data relationships that SAS
Enterprise Miner finds in the sample can be applied to the complete source
data set.

Table A1.2 Explore Nodes

Node Name Description

Association Use the Association node to identify association and sequence

relationships within the data. For example, “If a customer buys cat food,
how likely is the customer to also buy cat litter?” In the case of sequence
discovery, this question could be extended and posed as, “If a customer
buys cat food today, how likely is the customer to buy cat litter within the
next week?”

Cluster Use the Cluster node to perform observation clustering, which can be used
to segment databases. Clustering places objects into groups or clusters
suggested by the data. The objects in each cluster tend to be similar to each
other in some sense, and objects in different clusters tend to be dissimilar.

DMDB (Data The DMDB node creates a data mining database that provides summary
Mining Database) statistics and factor-level information for class and interval variables in the
imported data set. Improvements to SAS Enterprise Miner have eliminated
the previous need to use the DMDB node to optimize the performance of
nodes. However, the DMDB database can still provide quick summary
statistics for class and interval variables at a given point in a process flow
diagram.

Graph Explore The Graph Explore node is an advanced visualization tool that enables you
to interactively explore large volumes of data to uncover patterns and
trends and to reveal extreme values in the database. You can analyze
univariate distributions, investigate multivariate distributions, create scatter
and box plots, constellation and 3-D charts, and so on.
 About Nodes 51

Node Name Description

Link Analysis Link analysis is used to detect the linkages among items in transactional
data or linkages that might exist among levels of different variables in
training data. The Link Analysis node transforms data from different
sources into a data model that can be graphed. The node provides centrality
measures that are derived from the graph, and it performs item-cluster
detection for certain types of data. The item-cluster detection information
is used in segmentation for scoring purpose. The node also provides
recommendation tables for transactional input data.

Market Basket The Market Basket node performs association rule mining over transaction
data in conjunction with item taxonomy. Market basket analysis uses the
information from the transaction data to give you insight (for example,
about which products tend to be purchased together). The market basket
analysis is not limited to the retail marketing domain and can be abstracted
to other areas such as word co-occurrence relationships in text documents.

MultiPlot Use the MultiPlot node to visualize data from a wide range of perspectives.
The MultiPlot node automatically creates bar charts and scatter plots for
the input and target variables without requiring you to make several menu
or window item selections.

Path Analysis Use the Path Analysis node to analyze web log data and to determine the
paths that visitors take as they navigate through a website. You can also use
the node to perform sequence analysis.

SOM/Kohonen Use the SOM/Kohonen node to perform unsupervised learning by using

Kohonen vector quantization (VQ), Kohonen self-organizing maps
(SOMs), or batch SOMs with Nadaraya-Watson or local-linear smoothing.
Kohonen VQ is a clustering method, whereas SOMs are primarily
dimension-reduction methods.

StatExplore Use the StatExplore node to examine the statistical properties of an input
data set. You can use the StatExplore node to compute standard univariate
distribution statistics, to compute standard bivariate statistics by class
target and class segment, and to compute correlation statistics for interval
variables by interval input and target.

Variable Variable clustering is a useful tool for data reduction and can remove
Clustering collinearity, decrease variable redundancy, and help reveal the underlying
structure of the input variables in a data set. When properly used as a
variable-reduction tool, the Variable Clustering node can replace a large set
of variables with the set of cluster components with little loss of
information.

Variable Use the Variable Selection node to quickly identify input variables that are
Selection useful for predicting the target variable.
52 Appendix 1 • SAS Enterprise Miner Node Reference

Table A1.3 Modify Nodes

Node Name Description

Drop Use the Drop node to remove variables from data sets or hide variables
from the metadata. You can drop specific variables and all variables of a
particular type.

Impute Use the Impute node to replace missing values. For example, you could
replace missing values of an interval variable with the mean or using an M-
estimator such as Andrew’s Wave. Missing values for the training,
validation, test, and score data sets are replaced using imputation statistics
that are calculated from the active training predecessor data set.

Interactive The Interactive Binning node is an interactive grouping tool that you use to
Binning model nonlinear functions of multiple modes of continuous distributions.
The interactive tool computes initial bins by quantiles. Then you can
interactively split and combine the initial bins. This node enables you to
select strong characteristics based on the Gini statistic and to group the
selected characteristics based on business considerations. The node is
helpful in shaping the data to represent risk-ranking trends rather than
modeling quirks, which might lead to overfitting.

Principal Use the Principal Components node to generate principal components.

Components Principal components are uncorrelated linear combinations of the original
input variables and which depend on the covariance matrix or correlation
matrix of the input variables. In data mining, principal components are
usually used as the new set of input variables for subsequent analysis by
modeling nodes.

Replacement Use the Replacement node to generate score code to process unknown
levels when scoring and also to interactively specify replacement values
for class and interval levels. In some cases, you might want to reassign
specified nonmissing values before performing imputation calculations for
the missing values.

Rules Builder The Rules Builder node accesses the Rules Builder window so that you can
create ad hoc sets of rules with user-definable outcomes. You can
interactively define the values of the outcome variable and the paths to the
outcome. This is useful, for example, in applying logic for posterior
probabilities and scorecard values. Rules are defined using charts and
histograms based on a sample of the data.

Transform Use the Transform Variables node to create new variables or variables that
Variables are transformations of existing variables in the data. Transformations are
useful when you want to improve the fit of a model to the data. For
example, transformations can be used to stabilize variances, remove
nonlinearity, improve additivity, and correct non-normality in variables.
The Transform Variables node also enables you to create interaction
variables.
 About Nodes 53

Table A1.4 Model Nodes

Node Name Description

AutoNeural Use the AutoNeural node as an automated tool to help you find optimal
configurations for a neural network model.

Decision Tree Use the Decision Tree node to fit decision tree models to the data. The
implementation includes features that are found in a variety of popular
decision tree algorithms such as CHAID, CART, and C4.5. The node
supports both automatic and interactive training. When you run the
Decision Tree node in automatic mode, it automatically ranks the input
variables, based on the strength of their contribution to the tree. This
ranking can be used to select variables for use in subsequent modeling.
You can override any automatic step with the option to define a splitting
rule and prune explicit tools or subtrees. Interactive training enables you to
explore and evaluate a large set of trees as you develop them.

Dmine Use the Dmine Regression node to compute a forward stepwise least
Regression squares regression model. In each step, an independent variable is selected.
This independent variable contributes maximally to the model R-square
value.

DMNeural Use DMNeural node to fit an additive nonlinear model. The additive
nonlinear model uses bucketed principal components as inputs to predict a
binary or an interval target variable. The algorithm that is used in
DMNeural network training was developed to overcome the problems of
the common neural networks that are likely to occur especially when the
data set contains highly collinear variables.

Ensemble Use the Ensemble node to create new models by combining the posterior
probabilities (for class targets) or the predicted values (for interval targets)
from multiple predecessor models. One common ensemble approach is to
use multiple modeling methods, such as a neural network and a decision
tree, to obtain separate models from the same training data set. The
component models from the two complementary modeling methods are
integrated by the Ensemble node to form the final model solution

Gradient Gradient boosting creates a series of simple decision trees that together
Boosting form a single predictive model. Each tree in the series is fit to the residual
of the prediction from the earlier trees in the series. Each time the data is
used to grow a tree, the accuracy of the tree is computed. The successive
samples are adjusted to accommodate previously computed inaccuracies.
Because each successive sample is weighted according to the classification
accuracy of previous models, this approach is sometimes called stochastic
gradient boosting. Boosting is defined for binary, nominal, and interval
targets.

LARS (Least The LARs node can perform both variable selection and model-fitting
Angle tasks. When used for variable selection, the LARs node selects variables in
Regressions) a continuous fashion, where coefficients for each selected variable grow
from zero to the variable's least square estimates. With a small
modification, you can use LARs to efficiently produce LASSO solutions.

MBR (Memory- Use the MBR node to identify similar cases and to apply information that
Based is obtained from these cases to a new record. The MBR node uses k-
Reasoning) nearest neighbor algorithms to categorize or predict observations.
54 Appendix 1 • SAS Enterprise Miner Node Reference

Node Name Description

Model Import Use the Model Import node to import and assess a model that was not
created by one of the SAS Enterprise Miner modeling nodes. You can then
use the Model Comparison node to compare the user-defined model with
one or more models that you developed with a SAS Enterprise Miner
modeling node. This process is called integrated assessment.

Neural Network Use the Neural Network node to construct, train, and validate multilayer,
feed-forward neural networks. By default, the Neural Network node
automatically constructs a network that has one hidden layer consisting of
three neurons. In general, each input is fully connected to the first hidden
layer, each hidden layer is fully connected to the next hidden layer, and the
last hidden layer is fully connected to the output. The Neural Network
node supports many variations of this general form.

Partial Least The Partial Least Squares node is a tool for modeling continuous and
Squares binary targets. This node extracts factors called components or latent
vectors that can be used to explain response variation or predictor variation
in the analyzed data.

Regression Use the Regression node to fit both linear and logistic regression models to
the data. You can use continuous, ordinal, and binary target variables, and
you can use both continuous and discrete input variables. The node
supports the stepwise, forward, and backward selection methods.

Rule Induction Use the Rule Induction node to improve the classification of rare events.
The Rule Induction node creates a Rule Induction model that uses split
techniques to remove the largest pure split node from the data. Rule
Induction also creates binary models for each level of a target variable and
ranks the levels from the most rare event to the most common. After all
levels of the target variable are modeled, the score code is combined into a
SAS DATA step.

TwoStage Use the TwoStage node to build a sequential or concurrent two-stage

model for predicting a class variable and an interval target variable at the
same time. The interval target variable is usually a value that is associated
with a level of the class target.

Note: These modeling nodes use a directory table facility, called the Model Manager.
You can store models in Model Manager, and you can access stored models from
Model Manager on demand.

Table A1.5 Assess Nodes

Node Name Description

Cutoff The Cutoff node provides tabular and graphical information to assist you in
determining an appropriate probability cutoff point for decision making
with binary target models. The establishment of a cutoff decision point
entails the risk of generating false positives and false negatives, but an
appropriate use of the Cutoff node can help minimize those risks. You
typically run the node at least twice. In the first run, you obtain all the plots
and tables. In subsequent runs, you can change the node properties until an
optimal cutoff value is obtained.
 About Nodes 55

Node Name Description

Decisions Use the Decisions node to define target profiles for a target that produces
optimal decisions. The decisions are made using a user-specified decision
matrix and output from a subsequent modeling procedure.

Model Use the Model Comparison node to compare models and predictions from
Comparison any of the modeling nodes. The comparison is based on the expected and
actual profits or losses that would result from implementing the model. The
node produces the charts that help describe the usefulness of the model.

Score Use the Score node to manage SAS scoring code that is generated from a
trained model or models, to save the SAS scoring code to a location on the
client computer, and to run the SAS scoring code. Scoring is the generation
of predicted values for a data set that might not contain a target variable.

Segment Profile Use the Segment Profile node to examine segmented or clustered data and
identify factors that differentiate data segments from the population. The
node generates various reports that aid in exploring and comparing the
distribution of these factors within the segments and population.

Table A1.6 Utility Nodes

Node Name Description

Control Point Use the Control Point node to establish a control point within process flow
diagrams. A control point simplifies distributing the connections between
process flow steps that have multiple interconnected nodes. The Control
Point node can reduce the number of connections that are made.

End Groups The End Groups node is used only in conjunction with the Start Groups
node. The End Groups node acts as a boundary marker that defines the end
of group processing operations in a process flow diagram. Group
processing operations are performed on the portion of the process flow
diagram that exists between the Start Groups node and the End Groups
node. If you specify Stratified, Bagging, or Boosting in the group
processing function of the Start Groups node, then the End Groups node
functions as a model node and presents the final aggregated model.

Ext Demo The Ext Demo node illustrates the various controls that can be used in SAS
Enterprise Miner extension nodes. These controls enable users to pass
arguments to an underlying SAS program. By choosing an appropriate user
interface control, an extension node developer can specify how information
about the node's arguments are presented to the user and place restrictions
on the values of the arguments. The Ext Demo node's results also provide
examples of the various types of graphs that can be generated by an
extension node using the %EM_REPORT macro.

Metadata Use the Metadata node to modify the columns metadata information (such
as roles, measurement levels, and order) in a process flow diagram.

Open Source Use the Open Source Integration node to write code in the R language
Integration inside SAS Enterprise Miner.
56 Appendix 1 • SAS Enterprise Miner Node Reference

Node Name Description

Register Model The Register Model node enables you to register segmentation,
classification, or prediction models to the SAS Metadata Server. Models
registered in metadata can be submitted to SAS Model Manager, to score
data in SAS Enterprise Guide or to score data in SAS Enterprise Miner.
Information about input variables, output variables, target variables, target
levels, mining function, training data, and SAS score code is registered to
the metadata.

Reporter The Reporter node uses SAS Output Delivery System (ODS) capability to
create a single PDF or RTF file that contains information about the open
process flow diagram. The report shows the SAS Enterprise Miner settings,
process flow diagram, and detailed information for each node. The report
also includes results such as variable selection, model diagnostic tables,
and plots from the Results browser. The score code, log, and output listing
are not included in the report; those items are found in the SAS Enterprise
Miner package folder.

SAS Code Use the SAS Code node to incorporate new or existing SAS code into
process flows that you develop using SAS Enterprise Miner.

SAS Viya Code The SAS Viya Code node is a modified SAS Code node that is executed in
SAS Viya and CAS. It is template-based and is populated with basic
training code. The SAS Viya Code node assumes that a CAS server is
running on a specified port.

Save Data Use the Save Data node to save training, validation, test, score, or
transaction data from a node to either a previously defined SAS library or a
specified file path. The Save Data node can export JMP, Excel 2010, CSV,
and tab-delimited files.

Score Code The Score Code Export node is an extension for SAS Enterprise Miner that
Export exports files that are necessary for score code deployment. Extensions are
programmable add-ins for the SAS Enterprise Miner environment.

Start Groups The Start Groups node is useful when the data can be segmented or
grouped, and you want to process the grouped data in different ways. The
Start Groups node uses BY-group processing as a method to process
observations from one or more data sources that are grouped or ordered by
values of one or more common variables.

Table A1.7 Credit Scoring Nodes

Node Name Description

Credit Exchange Use the Credit Exchange node to exchange the data that is created in SAS
Enterprise Miner with the SAS Credit Risk Management solution.
 About Nodes 57

Interactive Use the Interactive Grouping node to perform grouping and initial
Grouping characteristic screening. The node provides an easy way to deal with rare
classes and outliers with interval variables. It also allows nonlinear
dependencies to be modeled with linear models. Distributions and
predictive power of each characteristic and each level of a characteristic
are calculated in order to make the relationships of your inputs easy to
understand.

Reject Inference Use the Reject Inference node to remedy selection bias. The reject
inference approach uses the model that was trained using the accepted
applications to score the rejected applications. The observations in the
rejected data set are classified as inferred non-event and inferred event
using the Fuzzy, Hard Cutoff, or Parceling method. The inferred
observations are then added to the accepts data set, which contains the
actual non-event and event records, to form an augmented data set. This
augmented data set serves as the training data set for a second scorecard
model.

Scorecard The Scorecard node computes credit scores in a two-step process. In the
first step, the Scorecard node fits a logistic regression model, which
estimates the ln(odds) as a linear function of the characteristics. The
Scorecard node uses the data set that is exported by the Interactive
Grouping node as the model's input data set. You can use either the
characteristics’ Weight of Evidence variables or the group variables as
inputs for the logistic regression model. In the second step, the Scorecard
node applies a linear transformation to the predicted ln(odds) to compute a
score for each attribute of each characteristic.

Table A1.8 HPDM (High-Performance Data Mining) Nodes

Node Name Description

HP Bayesian The HP Bayesian Network Classifier node creates a directed, acyclic

Network graphical model. The nodes represent random variables, and the links
Classifier between the nodes represent conditional dependency between two random
variables. The structure of a Bayesian network is based on the conditional
dependency between the variables. The available Bayesian network
structures are Naive, Tree-Augmented Naive (TAN), Bayesian Network
Augmented Naive (BAN), Parent Child (PC), and Markov Blanket (MB).

HP Cluster Use the HP Cluster node to perform observation clustering, which can be
used to segment databases. Clustering places objects into groups (or
clusters) that is suggested by the data. The objects in each cluster tend to
be similar to each other in some sense, and objects in different clusters tend
to be dissimilar.

HP Data Partition Use the HP Data Partition node to partition an input data set into a training
data set and a validation data set. The training data set is used for
preliminary model fitting. The validation data set is used to monitor and
tune the free model parameters during estimation. It is also used for model
assessment.
58 Appendix 1 • SAS Enterprise Miner Node Reference

HP Explore Use the HP Explore node to obtain descriptive information about a training
data set. Statistics such as mean, standard deviation, minimum value,
maximum value, and percentage of missing values are generated for each
input variable and are displayed in tabular and graphical form. This can
help determine whether any input variables will need additional pre-
processing such as imputation or transformation.

HP Forest A forest consists of several decision trees that differ from each other in two
ways. First, the training data for a tree is a sample without replacement
from all available observations. Second, the input variables that are
considered for splitting a node are randomly selected from all available
inputs. In other respects, trees in a forest are trained like standard trees.

HP GLM A generalized linear model (GLM) is an extension of traditional linear

(Generalized model that allows the population mean to depend on a linear predictor
Linear Model) through a nonlinear link function. For example, in insurance, claim
frequency is typically modeled with a Poisson distribution and a
logarithmic link function.

HP Impute Use the HP Impute node to replace missing values. For example, you could
replace missing values of an interval variable with the mean. Missing
values for the training, validation, test, and score data sets are replaced
using imputation statistics that are calculated from the active training
predecessor data set.

HP Neural The HP Neural node creates multilayer neural networks that pass
information from one layer to the next in order to map an input to a
specific category or predicted value. The HP Neural node enables this
mapping to take place in a distributed computing environment. This type of
computing environment enables you to build neural networks on massive
data sets in a relatively short amount of time. Most parameters for the
neural network are selected automatically. The parameters include
standardization of input and target variables, activation and error functions,
and termination of model training.

HP Principal Use the HP Principal Components node to generate principal components.

Components Principal components are uncorrelated linear combinations of the original
input variables, which depend on the covariance matrix or correlation
matrix of the input variables. In data mining, principal components are
usually used as the new set of input variables for subsequent analysis by
modeling nodes.

HP Regression The HP Regression node fits a linear regression or a logistic regression for
an interval, binary, nominal, or ordinal target variable that is specified in
the training data set. The HP Regression node supports the selection
methods backward, fast backward, forward, stepwise, LAR, and LASSO.

HP SVM A support vector machine (SVM) is a supervised machine learning method

(Support Vector that is used to perform classification and regression analysis. The standard
Machines) SVM problem solves binary classification problems that produce non-
probability output (only sign +1/-1). The solution results from constructing
a set of hyperplanes that maximize the margin between two classes.
 About Nodes 59

HP Text Miner The HP Text Miner node enables you to build predictive models for a
document collection in a distributed computing environment. Data is
processed in two phases: text parsing and transformation. Text parsing
processes textual data into a term-by-document frequency matrix.
Transformations such as singular value decomposition (SVD) alter this
matrix into a data set that is suitable for data mining purposes.

HP Transform The HP Transform node enables you to make transformations to your

interval input and target variables. Transformation of variables can be used
to stabilize variances, remove nonlinearity, and correct non-normality in
variables.

HP Tree The HP Tree node enables you to create and visualize a tree model and to
determine input variable importance. The HP Tree node includes many of
the tools and results that are also included in the Decision Tree node.

HP Variable Use the HP Variable Selection node to quickly identify input variables that
Selection are useful for predicting the target variable. Both unsupervised selection
and supervised selection are provided.

Table A1.9 Applications Nodes

Node Name Description

Incremental The Incremental Response node models the incremental impact of a

Response treatment in order to optimize customer targeting for maximum return on
investment. The Incremental Response node can determine the likelihood
that a customer purchases a product or uses a coupon. It can predict the
incremental revenue that is realized during a promotional period.

Survival Survival data mining is the application of survival analysis to data mining
problems concerning customers. The application to the business problem
changes the nature of the statistical techniques. The issue in survival data
mining is not whether an event will occur in a certain time interval, but
when the next event will occur. The SAS Enterprise Miner Survival node
performs survival analysis on mining customer databases when there are
time-dependent outcomes.

Table A1.10 Text Mining Nodes

Node Name Description

Text Cluster The Text Cluster node clusters documents into disjoint sets of documents
and reports on the descriptive terms for those clusters. Two clustering
algorithms are available. The Expectation Maximization algorithm clusters
documents with a flat representation, and the Hierarchical clustering
algorithm groups clusters into a tree hierarchy. Both approaches rely on the
singular value decomposition (SVD) to transform the originally weighted,
term-document frequency matrix into a dense but low-dimensional
representation.
60 Appendix 1 • SAS Enterprise Miner Node Reference

Text Filter The Text Filter node reduces the total number of parsed terms or
documents that are analyzed so that only the most valuable and relevant
information is considered. The term weighting options enable you to vary
the importance of terms based on how frequently the terms occur in
individual documents and how the terms are distributed throughout the
document collection. A search expression can be used to filter documents.
A dictionary data set can be specified for spell checking.

Text Import The Text Import node serves as a replacement for an Input Data node by
creating data sets dynamically from text files that are contained in a
directory or from the web. It filters (or extracts) the text from the files,
places a copy of the text in a plain text file, and creates a SAS data set with
a snippet, or possibly all, of the text. The output can be imported into the
Text Parsing node.

Text Parsing The Text Parsing node parses a document collection in order to quantify
information about the terms that that are contained. Start, stop, synonym,
and multi-term lists can be specified to improve processing. Start and stop
lists enable you to specify which terms are included in the analysis or those
that are not included in the analysis. Synonym lists enable you to specify
different words that should be processed in the same way as the same
representative parent term. Multi-term lists enable you to specify groups of
words that should be processed together as single terms.

Text Profile The Text Profile node enables you to profile a target variable using terms
found in the documents. For each level of a target variable, the node
generates a list of terms from the collection that describe that level. A
hierarchical Bayesian model is used to predict which terms are most likely
to describe the level. Prior probabilities are used to down-weight terms to
avoid just selecting the most common terms.

Text Rule Builder The Text Rule Builder node generates an ordered set of rules that together
are useful in describing and predicting a target variable. Each rule in the set
is associated with a specific target category. This specific target category
consists of a conjunction that indicates the presence or absence of one term
or a small subset of terms (for example, “term1” AND “term2” AND
(NOT “term3”)). A particular document matches this rule if and only if it
contains at least one occurrence of term1, at least one occurrence of term2,
but no occurrences of term3.

Text Topic The Text Topic node enables you to explore the document collection by
automatically associating terms and documents according to both
discovered and user-defined topics. Topics are collections of terms that
describe and characterize a main theme or idea. The approach is different
from clustering because clustering assigns each document to a unique
group. The Text Topic node assigns a score for each document and term to
each topic. Then thresholds are used to determine whether the association
is strong enough to consider that the document or term belongs to the topic.
As a result, documents and terms can belong to more than one topic or to
no topics at all.

Table A1.11 Time Series Nodes

Node Name Description

 About Nodes 61

TS Correlation The TS Correlation node provides autocorrelation and crosscorrelation

analysis for timestamped data. Crosscorrelation analysis is a similarity
measure of two time series as a function of time lag, which indicates the
time points where the two series are correlated. Autocorrelation analysis is
a special case of crosscorrelation analysis, where the input time series is
cross-correlated with itself. Therefore, the autocorrelation function
similarity peaks at lag zero.

TS Data The TS Data Preparation node helps you organize and format your data for
Preparation time series data mining. For example, a business might have many
suppliers and many customers, both with very large sets of associated
transactional data. Traditional data mining tasks become difficult because
of the size of the data set. By condensing the information into a time series,
you can discover trends and seasonal variations in the data, such as
customer and supplier habits that might not have been visible in the
transactional data. Transactional data is timestamped data that is collected
over time at no particular frequency. By contrast, time series data is
timestamped data that is collected over time at a specific frequency.

TS The TS Decomposition node is used for classical seasonal decomposition

Decomposition of the time series data. The default decomposition methods used are
Multiplicative, Pseudo-Additive, and Additive. Multiplicative is used when
the accumulated time series contains only positive values. Pseudo-Additive
is used when the accumulated time series contains only negative values.
Additive is used for all other conditions.

TS Dimension As a time series grows longer, its dimensionality increases and the sparsity
Reduction of the data increases. The TS Dimension Reduction node currently
supports five time series dimension reduction techniques. These techniques
are the Discrete Wavelet Transform, Discrete Fourier Transform, Singular
Value Decomposition, Line Segment Approximation with the Mean, and
Line Segment Approximation with the Sum. The goal is to approximate the
original time series with a more compact time series that retains as much
information from the original series as possible.

TS Exponential The TS Exponential Smoothing node generates forecasts using exponential

Smoothing smoothing models that have optimized smoothing weights for time series
data and transaction data. The TS Exponential Smoothing node also
provides the ability to detect and replace outliers, to export some distance
matrices, and to extend input time series to the future values.

TS Similarity The TS Similarity node computes similarity measures for timestamped

data with respect to time. Given two ordered numeric sequences (input and
target), such as two time series, a similarity measure is a metric that
measures the distance between the input sequence and the target sequence
while taking into account the ordering. Similarity measure analysis is
useful for clustering or classifying time series sequences that vary in length
or timing, pattern recognition, new product forecasting, and short life cycle
forecasting.
62 Appendix 1 • SAS Enterprise Miner Node Reference

Usage Rules for Nodes

Here are some general rules that govern the placement of nodes in a process flow
diagram:
• The Input Data Source node cannot be preceded by any other node.
• All nodes except the Input Data Source and SAS Code nodes must be preceded by a
node that exports a data set.
• The SAS Code node can be defined in any stage of the process flow diagram. It does
not require an input data set that is defined in the Input Data Source node.
• The Model Comparison node must be preceded by one or more modeling nodes.
• The Score node must be preceded by a node that produces score code. For example,
the modeling nodes produce score code.
• The Ensemble node must be preceded by a modeling node.
• The Replacement node must follow a node that exports a data set, such as a Data
Source, Sample, or Data Partition node.
 63

Appendix 2

Sample Data Reference

The following table lists the variables that are included in the sample data sets
donor_raw_data.sas7bdat and donor_score_data.sas7bdat.

Table A2.1 Variables in the Sample Data Sets

Variable Description

CARD_PROM_12 number of card promotions sent to the

individual by the charitable organization in the
past 12 months

CLUSTER_CODE one of 54 possible cluster codes, which are

unique in terms of socioeconomic status,
urbanicity, ethnicity, and other demographic
characteristics

CONTROL_NUMBER unique identifier of each individual

DONOR_AGE age as of last year's mail solicitation

DONOR_GENDER actual or inferred gender

FILE_AVG_GIFT this variable is identical to

LIFETIME_AVG_GIFT_AMT

FILE_CARD_GIFT lifetime average donation (in $) from the

individual in response to all card solicitations
from the charitable organization

FREQUENCY_STATUS_97NK based on the period of recency (determined by

RECENCY_STATUS_96NK), which is the
past 12 months for all groups except L and E. L
and E are 13–24 months ago and 25–36 months
ago, respectively: 1 if one donation in this
period, 2 if two donations in this period, 3 if
three donations in this period, and 4 if four or
more donations in this period.

HOME_OWNER H if the individual is a homeowner, U if this

information is unknown

INCOME_GROUP one of 7 possible income level groups based on

a number of demographic characteristics
64 Appendix 2 • Sample Data Reference

Variable Description

IN_HOUSE 1 if the individual has ever donated to the

charitable organization's In House program, 0
if not

LAST_GIFT_AMT amount of the most recent donation from the

individual to the charitable organization

LIFETIME_AVG_GIFT_AMT lifetime average donation (in $) from the

individual to the charitable organization

LIFETIME_CARD_PROM total number of card promotions sent to the

individual by the charitable organization

LIFETIME_GIFT_AMOUNT total lifetime donation amount (in $) from the

individual to the charitable organization

LIFETIME_GIFT_COUNT total number of donations from the individual

to the charitable organization

LIFETIME_GIFT_RANGE maximum donation amount from the individual

minus minimum donation amount from the
individual

LIFETIME_MAX_GIFT_AMT maximum donation amount (in $) from the

individual to the charitable organization

LIFETIME_MIN_GIFT_AMT minimum donation amount (in $) from the

individual to the charitable organization

LIFETIME_PROM total number of promotions sent to the

individual by the charitable organization

MEDIAN_HOME_VALUE median home value (in $100) as determined by

other input variables

MEDIAN_HOUSEHOLD_INCOME median household income (in $100) as

determined by other input variables

MONTHS_SINCE_FIRST_GIFT number of months since the first donation from

the individual to the charitable organization

MONTHS_SINCE_LAST_GIFT number of months since the most recent

donation from the individual to the charitable
organization

MONTHS_SINCE_LAST_PROM_RESP number of months since the individual has

responded to a promotion by the charitable
organization

MONTHS_SINCE_ORIGIN number of months that the individual has been

in the charitable organization's database
 Sample Data Reference 65

Variable Description

MOR_HIT_RATE total number of known times the donor has

responded to a mailed solicitation from a group
other than the charitable organization

NUMBER_PROM_12 number of promotions (card or other) sent to

the individual by the charitable organization in
the past 12 months

OVERLAY_SOURCE the data source against which the individual

was matched: M if Metromail, P if Polk, B if
both

PCT_ATTRIBUTE1 percent of residents in the neighborhood in

which the individual lives that are males and
active military

PCT_ATTRIBUTE2 percent of residents in the neighborhood in

which the individual lives that are males and
veterans

PCT_ATTRIBUTE3 percent of residents in the neighborhood in

which the individual lives that are Vietnam
veterans

PCT_ATTRIBUTE4 percent of residents in the neighborhood in

which the individual lives that are WWII
veterans

PCT_OWNER_OCCUPIED percent of owner-occupied housing in the

neighborhood in which the individual lives

PEP_STAR 1 if individual has ever achieved STAR donor

status, 0 if not

PER_CAPITA_INCOME per capita income (in $) of the neighborhood in

which the individual lives

PUBLISHED_PHONE 1 if the individual's telephone number is

published, 0 if not

RECENCY_STATUS_96NK recency status as of two years ago: A if active

donor, S if star donor, N if new donor, E if
inactive donor, F if first time donor, L if
lapsing donor

RECENT_AVG_CARD_GIFT_AMT average donation from the individual in

response to a card solicitation from the
charitable organization since four years ago

RECENT_AVG_GIFT_AMT average donation (in $) from the individual to

the charitable organization since four years ago
66 Appendix 2 • Sample Data Reference

Variable Description

RECENT_CARD_RESPONSE_COUNT number of times the individual has responded

to a card solicitation from the charitable
organization since four years ago

RECENT_CARD_RESPONSE_PROP proportion of responses to the individual to the

number of card solicitations from the charitable
organization since four years ago

RECENT_RESPONSE_COUNT number of times the individual has responded

to a promotion (card or other) from the
charitable organization since four years ago

RECENT_RESPONSE_PROP proportion of responses to the individual to the

number of (card or other) solicitations from the
charitable organization since four years ago

RECENT_STAR_STATUS 1 if individual has achieved star donor status

since four years ago, 0 if not

SES one of 5 possible socioeconomic codes

classifying the neighborhood in which the
individual lives

TARGET_B 1 if individual donated in response to last year's

97NK mail solicitation from the charitable
organization, 0 if individual did not

TARGET_D amount of donation (in $) from the individual

in response to last year's 97NK mail
solicitation from the charitable organization

URBANICITY classification of the neighborhood in which the

individual lives: U if urban, C if city, S if
suburban, T if town, R if rural, ? if missing

WEALTH_RATING one of 10 possible wealth rating groups based

on a number of demographic characteristics
 67

Recommended Reading

Here is the recommended reading list for this title:

• The online Help for SAS Enterprise Miner
• “Customer Segmentation and Clustering Using SAS Enterprise Miner”
• “Data Preparation for Analytics Using SAS”
• “Predictive Modeling with SAS Enterprise Miner: Practical Solutions for Business
Applications”
• “Decision Trees for Analytics Using SAS Enterprise Miner”

For a complete list of SAS publications, go to sas.com/store/books. If you have

questions about which titles you need, please contact a SAS Representative:
SAS Books
SAS Campus Drive
Cary, NC 27513-2414
Phone: 1-800-727-0025
Fax: 1-919-677-4444
Email: [email protected]
Web address: sas.com/store/books
68 Recommended Reading
 69

Glossary

assessment
the process of determining how well a model computes good outputs from input data
that is not used during training. Assessment statistics are automatically computed
when you train a model with a modeling node. By default, assessment statistics are
calculated from the validation data set.

attribute
See variable attribute.

CART
See classification and regression tree.

CHAID
See chi-squared automatic interaction detection.

champion model
the best predictive model that is chosen from a pool of candidate models in a data
mining environment.

chi-squared automatic interaction detection (CHAID)

a technique for building decision trees. The CHAID technique specifies a
significance level of a chi-square test to stop tree growth.

classification and regression tree (CART)

a decision tree technique that is used for classifying or segmenting a data set. The
technique provides a set of rules that can be applied to new data sets in order to
predict which records will have a particular outcome. It also segments a data set by
creating 2-way splits. The CART technique requires less data preparation than
CHAID.

data mining database (DMDB)

a SAS data set that is designed to optimize the performance of the modeling nodes.
DMDBs enhance performance by reducing the number of passes that the analytical
engine needs to make through the data. Each DMDB contains a meta catalog, which
includes summary statistics for numeric variables and factor-level information for
categorical variables.
70 Glossary

data mining model (model)

a formula or algorithm that computes outputs from inputs. A data mining model
includes information about the conditional distribution of the target variables, given
the input variables.

data set
See SAS data set.

dependent variable (response variable, experimental variable)

a variable that is observed to change in response to the independent variables. In a
function y=f(x), the value of the dependent variable y is a function of the
independent variable x.

depth
the number of successive hierarchical partitions of the data in a tree. The initial,
undivided segment has a depth of 0.

DMDB
See data mining database.

experimental variable
See dependent variable.

Gini index
a measure of the total leaf impurity in a decision tree.

hidden layer
in a neural network, a layer between input and output to which one or more
activation functions are applied. Hidden layers are typically used to introduce
nonlinearity.

imputation
the computation of replacement values for missing input values.

input variable
a variable that is used in a data mining process to predict the value of one or more
target variables.

interval variable
a continuous variable that contains values across a range. For example, a continuous
variable called Temperature could have values such as 0, 32, 34, 36, 43.5, 44, 56, 80,
99, 99.9, and 100.

leaf
in a tree diagram, any segment that is not further segmented. The final leaves in a
tree are called terminal nodes.

logistic regression
a form of regression analysis in which the target variable (response variable)
represents a binary-level, categorical, or ordinal-level response.

metadata
descriptive data about data that is stored and managed in a database, in order to
facilitate access to captured and archived data for further use.
 Glossary 71

MLP
See multilayer perceptron.

model
See data mining model.

multilayer perceptron (MLP)

a neural network that has one or more hidden layers, each of which has a linear
combination function and executes a nonlinear activation function on the input to
that layer. See also hidden layer.

neural network
any of a class of models that usually consist of a large number of neurons,
interconnected in complex ways and organized into layers. Examples are flexible
nonlinear regression models, discriminant models, data reduction models, and
nonlinear dynamic systems.

observation
a row in a SAS data set. All of the data values in an observation are associated with a
single entity such as a customer or a state. Each observation contains either one data
value or a missing-value indicator for each variable.

overfit
to train a model to the random variation in the sample data. Overfitted models
contain too many parameters (weights), and they do not generalize well. See also
underfit.

PFD
See process flow diagram.

predicted value
in a regression model, the value of a dependent variable that is calculated by
evaluating the estimated regression equation for a specified set of values of the
explanatory variables.

prior probability
a probability that reflects knowledge about the population before obtaining the
sample on hand.

process flow diagram (PFD)

a graphical sequence of interconnected symbols that represent an ordered set of steps
or tasks that, when combined, form a workflow designed to yield an analytical result.

profit matrix
a table of expected revenues and expected costs for each decision alternative for each
level of a target variable.

project
a user-created GUI entity that contains the related SAS Enterprise Miner components
required for the data mining models. A project contains SAS Enterprise Miner data
sources, process flow diagrams, and results data sets and model packages.

pruning
the process of removing nodes from a decision tree when those nodes involve less
than optimal decision rules.
72 Glossary

response variable
See dependent variable.

root
See root node.

root node (root)

the topmost level in a hierarchical tree, representing the entire tree and its contents.

sampling
the process of subsetting a population into n cases. Sampling decreases the time
required for fitting a model.

SAS data set (data set)

a file whose contents are in one of the native SAS file formats. There are two types
of SAS data sets: SAS data files and SAS data views.

SAS variable (variable)

a column in a SAS data set or in a SAS data view. The data values for each variable
describe a single characteristic for all observations (rows).

SEMMA
the data mining process that is used by SAS Enterprise Miner. SEMMA stands for
Sample, Explore, Modify, Model, and Assess.

subdiagram
in a process flow diagram, a collection of nodes that are compressed into a single
node. The use of subdiagrams can improve your control of the information flow in
the diagram.

target variable
a variable whose values are known in one or more data sets that are available (in
training data, for example) but whose values are unknown in one or more future data
sets (in a score data set, for example). Data mining models use data from known
variables to predict the values of target variables.

training data
data that contains input values and target values that are used to train and build
predictive models.

transformation
in statistics, the process of applying a function to a variable in order to adjust the
variable's range, variability, or both.

tree structure
a type of data structure that uses the graphic analogy of a tree with branches and
leaves. Each set of leaves represents an optimal segmentation of the branches above
it, according to a statistical measure and the rules that govern the structure.

underfit
to train a model to only part of the actual patterns in the sample data. Underfit
models contain too few parameters (weights), and they do not generalize well. See
also overfit.
 Glossary 73

validation data
data that is used to validate the suitability of a data model that was developed using
training data. Both training data sets and validation data sets contain target variable
values. Target variable values in the training data are used to train the model. Target
variable values in the validation data set are used to compare the training model's
predictions to the known target values, assessing the model's fit before using the
model to score new data.

variable
See SAS variable.

variable attribute (attribute)

any of the following characteristics that are associated with a particular variable:
name, label, format, informat, data type, and length.

variable level
the set of data dimensions for binary, interval, or class variables. Binary variables
have two levels. A binary variable CREDIT could have levels of 1 and 0, Yes and
No, or Accept and Reject. Interval variables have levels that correspond to the
number of interval variable partitions. For example, an interval variable
PURCHASE_AGE might have levels of 0-18, 19-39, 40-65, and >65. Class variables
have levels that correspond to the class members. For example, a class variable
HOMEHEAT might have four variable levels: Coal/Wood, FuelOil, Gas, and
Electric. Data mining decision and profit matrixes are composed of variable levels.
74 Glossary
 75

Index

A G
accessibility features 3 Gradient Boosting 29
Append node 49 Gradient Boosting node 53
Association node 50 Graph Explore node 50
AutoNeural node 53 graphical user interface 4

C I
Cluster node 50 Impute node 32, 52
Control Point node 43, 55 Incremental Response node 59
Cutoff node 54 Input node 50
Interactive Binning node 52

D
Data Partition node 20, 49 L
data source LARS node 53
create new 13, 45 library
Data Source Wizard 13, 45 create new 12
decision tree Library Wizard 12
and missing value imputation 32 logistic regression 35
depth 24
leaf size 24
surrogate rules 25 M
train automatically 24 Market Basket node 51
train interactively 26 MBR node 53
Decision Tree node 24, 26, 53 Merge node 50
Decisions node 55 Metadata node 55
DMDB node 50 missing values 31
Dmine Regression node 53 Model Comparison node 43, 55
DMNeural node 53 Model Import node 54
Drop node 52 MultiPlot node 51

E N
End Groups node 55 Neural Network node 40, 54
Ensemble node 53
Ext Demo node 55
P
Partial Least Squares node 54
F Path Analysis node 51
File Import node 50 Principal Components node 52
File Importnode 13 process flow diagram
Filter node 50 create new 15
project
76 Index

create new 12 Segment Profile node 55

SEMMA steps 1
SOM/Kohonen node 51
R Start Groups node 56
Regression node 35, 54 StatExplore node 17, 51
Replacement node 21, 52 Survival node 59
Reporter node 56
Rule Induction node 54
Rules Builder node 52 T
Transform Variables node 33, 52
TwoStage node 54
S
sample data location 8
Sample node 50 V
SAS Code node 46, 56 Variable Clustering node 51
Score Code Export node 56 Variable Selection node 51
Score node 55