20+ Must-Know SAS Grid Administration Interview Questions

Last updated on 12th Nov 2021, Blog, Interview Questions

If you’re seeming for SAS Grid Administration Interview Questions for Experienced or Freshers, you are in the best place. There are a lot of possibilities from many presumed companies in the world. According to research, SAS Grid Administration has a business share of about 21.3%. So, You still have the chance to move onward in your career as a SAS Administrator. ACTE suggests Advanced SAS Grid Administration Interview Questions 2021 that support you in cracking your interview & acquiring a dream job as SAS Admin.

1. What is SAS?

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SAS which is often referred to as a leader when it comes to Analytics is an innovative software through which it enables and inspires its clients around the globe to transform data into intelligence.

As a SAS administrator, you will have three roles to play namely

• Platform oriented support
• User-oriented support
• Data-oriented support

2. What is the role of SAS GRID ADMINISTRATOR?

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The SAS Platform Administrator/GRID Administrator fills in as contact between the SAS Developers and enterprise infrastructure support teams to ensure the proper delivery of technology solutions as per business requirements and objectives.

The SAS Platform Administrator or SAS GRID Administrator makes sure that the platform is positioned for compliance with IT policies and standards and agreed upon service levels

3. What is a Connection profile?

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A connection profile can be described as a file that is stored on a desktop that contains the necessary information to connect to your metadata profile.

4. How do you connect the desktop application to the Metadata server?

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A Desktop application is connected to a Metadata server with the help of a connection profile. So as soon as you answer this question, the interviewer next question would be.

5. What are the five ways to do a table lookup in SAS?

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The five ways to do a table lookup are:

• Match merging
• Direct access
• Format tables
• Arrays
• PROC SQL

6. What is the role of Administrative users?

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Administrative users have access to the Metadata layer which a typical end-user doesn’t have.

7. What is the role of unrestrictive users?

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As the name suggests Unrestrictive users don’t have access to the Metadata layer, they just perform tasks when the Metadata server is paused.

8. In SAS, what are the areas that you are most interested in?

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The areas that I am most interested in SAS are:

• BASE
• STAT
• GRAPH
• ETS

9. What are the different versions of SAS that you have used until now?

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The different versions of SAS that I have used until now are:

SAS 9.1.3 in Windows and UNIX

SAS 9.0 in Windows and UNIX

SAS 8.2 in Windows and UNIX

SAS 7 and

SAS 6.12

10. What are the best SAS programming practices for handling very large datasets?

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Some of the best SAS programming practices to handle very large data sets are

• Sampling method using OBS option or subsetting
• commenting the Lines
• Use Data Null

11. How does the internal authentication work in SAS?

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During the login time, let us say you have entered your credentials that it requires, it sends the information to Metadata servers which checks whether the credential details are right or wrong with the available credentials in its database and it accepts the client connection after validating the credentials.

Metadata servers use SAS identity associated with the internal account to accept the connection.

12. Describe Grid Architecture with SAS Grid Manager?

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The following diagram is a conceptual view of the SAS Grid Manager architecture when using SAS Workload Orchestrator and SAS Job Flow Scheduler.

13.What are the best SAS programming practices for handling very large datasets?

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Some of the best SAS programming practices to handle very large data sets are:

• Sampling method using OBS option or subsetting
• commenting the Lines
• Use Data Null

14. How does the internal authentication work in SAS?

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During the login time, let us say you have entered your credentials that it requires, it sends the information to Metadata servers which checks whether the credential details are right or wrong with the available credentials in its database and it accepts the client connection after validating the credentials.

Metadata servers use SAS identity associated with the internal account to accept the connection.

15. What do you know about SAS and what we do?

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SAS turns numbers into a beautiful presentation that allows organizations or government entities to make proper decisions based on that data.

16. What are the different operating system platforms in which we can use SAS?

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We can use SAS in two different operating systems, they are:

• UNIX OR LINUX
• WINDOWS

17. Is Native Javascript supports modules?

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The following diagram is a conceptual view of the SAS Grid Architecture when using SAS Grid Manager for Hadoop.

18. Name some categories in SAS 9?

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Some categories in SAS 9 are:

• Array
• Bitwise logical operations
• Descriptive statistics
• Trigonometric
• Macro
• Mathematical
• Financial’
• Hyperbolic
• SAS file I/O
• Variable control

19. What are the different servers in SAS?

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There are 5 different SAS servers, they are:

• SAS metadata server
• SAS OLAP server
• SAS/SHARE server
• SAS table server
• SAS deployment tester server.

20. Name any two SAS spawners?

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Two SAS spawners are:>

• SAS object spawner
• SSAS/CONNECT spawner

21. Explain the use of PROC gplot?

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With the help of PROC gplot, we can create fancier and colorful graphics as it has a number of options to choose from.

22. Differentiate between FORMAT and INFORMAT?

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The difference between FORMAT and INFORMAT module is given below:

Format	InFormat
This indicates SAS to print the variables	This indicates SAS where a number should be read in a particular format.

23. What is the general format of function In SAS?

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• myvalue=FUNCTION_NAME(required_argument1, …, required_argumentN,optional_argument1,…,optional_argumentN);

24. Describe what are the different levels of administrative users in SAS?

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There are basically two levels of administrative users in SAS, they are:

• Administrative
• Unrestrictive users

25. In SAS admin differentiate between roles and capabilities?

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ROLES	CAPABILITIES
This indicates SAS to print the variables	The features in applications that provide role-based management are called capabilities

26. For what purpose would you use the RETAIN statement?

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The retain statement is used to hold the values of variables across iterations of the data step. Normally, all variables in the data step are set to missing at the start of each iteration of the data step. What is the order of evaluation of the comparison operators: + – * / ** ()?A) (), **, *, /, +, –.

27. What Is Connection Profile?

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Connection profile can be defined as a record that is saved on a desktop which incorporates the important statistics to connect to your metadata profile.

28.Where are the data Programs?

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29. What is the function of the Stop statement in a SAS Program?

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Stop statement causes SAS to stop processing the current data step immediately and resume processing statement after the end of current data step.

30. What is the difference between using drop = data set option in data statement and set statement?

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Data statement	Set statement
Whereas If I want to process certain variables and do not want them to appear in the new data set, then specify drop = data set option in the data statement.	If you don’t want to process certain variables and you do not want them to appear in the new data set, then specify drop = data set option in the set statement.

31. How many data types are there in SAS?

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There are two data types in SAS. Character and Numeric. Apart from this, dates are also considered as characters although there are implicit functions to work upon dates

32. What is the difference between SAS functions and procedures?

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SAS functions	Procedures
Functions expect argument values to be supplied across an observation in a SAS data set whereas a procedure expects one variable value per observation.	Proc means is used to calculate average temperature by month (taking one variable value across an observation). Here, the procedure means the month variable.
For eg, data average ; set temp ; avg temp = mean( of T1 – T24 ) ; run ;	For eg, proc sort ; by month ; run ; proc means ; by month ; var avg temp ; run ;

33. Give an example where SAS fails to convert character value to numeric value automatically?

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Suppose the value of a variable PayRate begins with a dollar sign ($). When SAS tries to automatically convert the values of PayRate to numeric values, the dollar sign blocks the process. The values cannot be converted to numeric values.

Therefore, it is always best to include INPUT and PUT functions in your programs when conversions occur.

34. How do you delete duplicate observations in SAS?

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• By using nodups in the procedureProc sort data=SAS-Dataset nodups;
• by var;
• run;
• By using an SQL query inside a procedure
• Proc sql;
• Create SAS-Dataset as select * from Old-SAS-Dataset where var=distinct(var);
• quit;
• By cleaning the data
• Set temp;
• By group;
• If first.group and last.group then
• Run;

35. Suppose the variable address stores the following expression?

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• 209 RADCLIFFE ROAD, CENTER CITY, NY, 92716
• a=scan(address,3);
• b=scan(address,3,’,’);
• a=Road; b=NY

36. What is the work of tranwrd function?

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TRANWRD function replaces or removes all occurrences of a pattern of characters within a character string

37. What are the differences between sum function and using “+” operator?

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Sum function	+ Operator
SUM function returns the sum of non-missing arguments	+” operator returns a missing value if any of the arguments are missing.

38. Name few SAS functions?

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Scan, Substr, trim, Catx, Index, tranwrd, find, Sum.

39. Consider the following SAS Program?

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• data finance.earnings;
• Amount=100.
• Rate=.075/12;
• do month=1 to 12;
• Earned+(amount+earned)*(rate);
• end;
• run;

40. What are the differences between PROC MEANS and PROC SUMMARY?

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PROC MEANS	PROC SUMMARY
PROC MEANS produces subgroup statistics only when a BY statement is used and the input data has been previously sorted (using PROC SORT) by the BY variables	PROC SUMMARY does not produce any information in your output. So you will need to use the OUTPUT statement to create a new DATA SET and use PROC PRINT to see the computed statistics.
sorting a data set by the variables that define each subgroup and running PROC MEANS.	PROC SUMMARY automatically produces statistics for all subgroups, giving you all the information in one run that you would get by repeatedly

41. What can be the size of the largest dataset in SAS?

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The number of observations is limited only by the computer’s capacity to handle and store them. Prior to SAS 9.1, SAS data sets could contain up to 32,767 variables. In SAS 9.1, the maximum number of variables in a SAS data set is limited by the resources available on your computer.

42. Give some examples where PROC REPORT’s defaults are different from PROC PRINT’s defaults?

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No Record Numbers in Proc Report
Labels (not var names) used as headers in Proc Report
REPORT needs NO WINDOWS option

43. Give some examples where PROC REPORT’s defaults are the same as PROC PRINT’s defaults?

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• Variables/Columns in position order.
• VRows ordered as they appear in the data set.

44. Describe Take Advantage of Parallel Processing?

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45. What is the basic structure of the SAS base program?

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The basic structure of SAS consist of
==DATA step, which recovers & manipulates data.
==PROC step, which interprets the data.

46. What is the basic syntax style in SAS?

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To run the program successfully, and you have the following basic elements:

There should be a semicolon at the end of every line

A data statement that defines your data set

• Input statement
• There should be at least one space between each word or statement
• A run statement
• For example: In file ‘H: \StatHW\yourfilename.dat’;

47. Explain data step in SAS?

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The Data step creates a SAS dataset which carries the data along with a “data dictionary.” The data dictionary holds information about the variables and their properties.

48. What are the data types SAS contains?

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The data types in SAS are Numeric and Character.

49. What is Sample “parallel and combine”: setup?

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• %let workroot=/SASDATA/shared/workshr;
• %makename(outname=workdir);
• %makedir(&workroot,&workdir);
• %let datawrk=&workroot/&workdir;
• libname tempshr “&datawrk”;
• %let grid_rc=%sysfunc(grdsvc_enable(_all_,resource=SASApp));

50. Which statement does not perform automatic conversions in comparisons?

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In SAS, the “where” statement does not perform automatic conversions in comparisons.

51. Explain Sample “parallel and combine”?

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• %let j=1;
• signon tsk&j cmacvar=signonstatus inheritlib=(tempshr);;
• %syslput j=&j;
• %syslput workdir=&workdir;
• rsubmit tsk&j wait=no connectpersist=no;
• <<< enter code
• endrsubmit;
• 37
• Meridian Analytics
• Repeat for job 2
• %let j=2;
• signon tsk&j cmacvar=signonstatus inheritlib=(tempshr);;
• %syslput j=&j;
• %syslput workdir=&workdir;
• rsubmit tsk&j wait=no connectpersist=no;
• <<< enter code
• endrsubmit;

52. How Running SAS Grid on AWS?

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Reference architecture for deploying high-performing Amazon FSx for Lustre file system storage and guidance for the types of Amazon EC2 instances best suited for the SAS Grid compute tier

53. What is the difference between nodupkey and nodup options?

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The difference between the NODUP and NODUPKEY is that NODUP compares all the variables in our dataset while NODUPKEY compares just the BY variables

54. Describe the Sample “parallel and combine”: wait and combine

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• Waitfor _all_;
• data combine;
• merge tempshr.test1
• tempshr.test2;
• by ………
• run;

55. Name validation tools used in SAS?

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For DataSet : Data set name/ debug Data set: Name/stmtchk

For SAS Macros variables: Options: mprint mlogic symbolgen

56. What does PROC print, and PROC contents do?

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To display the contents of the SAS dataset PROC print is used and also to assure that the data were read into SAS correctly. While PROC CONTENTS display information about a SAS dataset.

57. What is the use of the function Proc summary?

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The syntax of proc summary is the same as that of proc means. It computes descriptive statistics on numeric variables in the SAS dataset.

58. Explain the architecture of Chef Automate in SAS grid?

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59. What Proc glm does?

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Proc glm performs simple and multiple regression, analysis of variance (ANOVAL), analysis of covariance, multivariate analysis of variance and repeated measure analysis of variance.

60. What are SAS informats?

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SAS INFORMATS are used to read, or input data from external files known as Flat Files ASCII files, text files or sequential files). The informat will tell SAS on how to read data into SAS variables.

61. Name types of category in which SAS Informats are placed

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SAS informats are placed in three categories,

Character Informats : $INFORMATe

Numeric Informats : INFORMAT w.d

Date/Time Informats: INFORMAT w.

62. What function does CATX syntax do?

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CATX syntax concatenate character strings remove trailing and leading blanks and inserts separators

64. Describe the architecture consisting of grid and non-grid aware processes?

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65. What is the use of PROC gplot?

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PROC gplot has more options and can create more colorful and fancier graphics.

66. What is the SAS data set?

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A SAS data set is a file consisting of two parts.

• A descriptor portion

• A data portion

67. List out some key concept of SAS?

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• SORT procedure
• Missing values
• KEEP=, DROP= dataset options
• Data step logic
• Reset to missing, or the RETAIN statement
• Log
• FORMAT procedure for creating value formats
• Data types
• IN= dataset option

68. What is the difference between INPUT and INFILE ?

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INPUT	INFILE
INFILE statement is used to identify an external file	INPUT statement is used to describe your variables

69. List types of scopes available in Javascript?

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70. What are common programming errors committed in SAS

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Common programming errors committed in SAS are,

• Missing semicolon
• Not checking log after submitting program
• Not using debugging techniques
• Not using Fsview option vigorously

71.  How to limit decimal places for the variable using PROC MEANS?

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To limit decimal places, use the MAXDEC= option and set it equal to the length that you prefer. By default, PROC MEANS computes statistics for all numeric variables. To specify the variables to include in PROC MEANS output, list them in a VAR statement.

72. What are the differences between the SAS DATA STEP and SAS PROCs?

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SAS DATA STEP	SAS PROCs
SAS DATA STEP is used to read in and manipulate data	SAS PROCs are sub-routines perform tasks on SAS data set

73. How to create a permanent SAS data set?

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In order to create a permanent SAS data set, there are two steps necessary,

Assign a library and engine.

Create the data. Make sure to assign both a library (other than WORK) and data set name to make the data set permanent.

74. What is SLIBREF?

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SLIBREF is a server-libref. It specifies the libref that is used by the server to identify the SAS data library when no physical name is determined, and the server libref is different from the client libref.

75. Steps to maximize storage I/O performance

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SAS Grid requires a shared file system, and we wanted to benchmark the performance of FSx for Lustre as the chosen shared file system against various EC2 instance families that meet the minimum requirements of 8 GB of physical RAM per core and 100–125 MB/second throughput per physical core.

• $ sudo mount -t lustre -o noatime,flock fs-0123456789abcd.fsx.us-west- 2.amazonaws.com@tcp:/za3atbmv /fsx
• $ mount -t lustre
• 172.31.41.37@tcp:/za3atbmv on /fsx type lustre
• (rw,noatime,seclabel,flock,lazystatfs)

76. What is the command used to find missing values?

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The command used to find missing values is

missing_values=MISSING(field1,field2,field3);

77. What are the functions it performs?

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• Using SAS we can analyze, change, manipulate and retrieve data.
• It can perform numerical Analysis.
• We can write programs that analyze data and create reports with the help of several SAS tools.
• Using SAS, we can get quality data analytics.

78. What are the parameters of the Scan function?

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Scan function is written in the following way:

scan(argument, n, delimiters)

Here argument indicates the character variable or expression, ‘n’ indicates which word to read and delimiters are the special characters that are to be enclosed in single quotes

79. What is the difference between DO WHILE and DO UNTIL?

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DO WHILE	DO UNTIL
Statement is that DO WHILE expression is evaluated at the top of DO loop. DO loop is executed for the first time, if the expression is false, then it will never execute	But DO UNTIL executes at least once.

80. How to create multiple observations from a single observation?

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Using double trailing @@ we can create multiple observations from a single observation.

81. What does filename do in SAS?

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The FILENAME statement associates a SAS fileref (a file reference name) with an external file’s complete name (directory plus file name). The fileref is then used as a shorthand reference to the file in the SAS programming statements that access external files (INFILE, FILE, and %INCLUDE).

82. What are the scrubbing procedures in SAS?

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The scrubbing procedures in SAS are NODUPKEY and Proc Sort options. It eliminates the duplicate values.

83. How can you merge or combine datasets in SAS?

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Using the following Syntax we can merge or combine datasets in SAS.

• Data combined;
• Merge data1 data2;
• run;

84. Which function is used to count the number of intervals between two SAS dates?

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To count the number of intervals between two SAS dates, the interval function INTCK is used.

INTCK(interval,start-of-period,end-of-period)

85. How to Convert XGBoost model to VBA?

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• # import packages
• import pandas as pd
• import numpy as np
• import os
• import re
• from sklearn import datasets
• from xgboost import XGBClassifier
• from sklearn.model_selection import train_test_split
• from sklearn.metrics import accuracy_score
• import m2cgen as m2c
• # import data
• iris = datasets.load_iris()
• X = iris.data
• Y = iris.target

86. How SAS treats the DSD delimiters?

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When you define DSD, SAS treats two consecutive delimiters as a missing value and removes quotation marks from character values.

87. How to import the packages and data needed for this task?

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• # split data into train and test sets
• seed = 2020
• test_size = 0.3
• X_train, X_test, y_train, y_test = train_test_split(X, Y, test_size=test_size, random_state=seed)
• # fit model on training data
• model = XGBClassifier()
• model.fit(X_train, y_train)

88. What are the good SAS programming practices for processing large data sets?

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The good SAS programming practices for processing large data sets is to sort them once using firstobs= and obs=

89. What SAS features do you use to check errors and data validation?

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To check errors, use the Log, and for data validation use things like Proc Freq, Proc Means or sometimes Proc print to see how data looks.

90. How can we perform model selection in SAS STAT??

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There are two procedures in SAS STAT, PROC GLMSELECT and PROC QUANTSELECT for performing model selection.

91. What is the Smart Grid IT Systems Market ?

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By application, the distribution segment is the largest contributor in the smart grid market in 2020. Efficient distribution application helps in quicker restoration of electricity after power disturbances, reduces operations and management costs for utilities, and ultimately lowers the power costs for consumers.

92. How can continuous variables be included in the SPP procedure?

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In a spatial analysis, CONTINUOUS variables term field variables and are associated with a spatial trend. They are included in the SPP procedure by using the TREND statement.

93. What are the required statements in a PROC VARIOGRAM procedure?

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The PROC VARIOGRAM statement invokes the VARIOGRAM procedure. ODS Graphics must be enabled before plots can be requested.