[R] Inefficiency of SAS Programming

[Marc Schwartz]

on 02/27/2009 07:57 AM Frank E Harrell Jr wrote:
> Ajay ohri wrote:
>>
>> I would like to know if we can create a package in which r functions
>> are renamed closer to sas language.doing so will help people familiar
>> to SAS to straight away take to R for their work,thus decreasing the
>> threshold for acceptance - and then get into deeper understanding later.
>>
>> since it is a package it would be optional only for people wanting to
>> try out R from SAS.. Do we have such a package right now..it basically
>> masks R functions to the equivalent function in another language just
>> for user ease /beginners
>>
>> for example
>>
>> creating function for means
>>  procmeans<-function(x,y)
>> + {
>> summary (
>> subset(x,select=c(x,y))
>> +
>> )
>>
>> creating function for importing csv
>>
>> procimport <-function(x,y)
>> + {
>> read.csv(
>> textConnection(x),row.names=y,na.strings="  "
>> +
>> )
>>
>>
>> creating function fo describing data
>>
>> procunivariate<-function(x)
>> + {
>> summary(x)
>> +
>> )
>>
>> regards,
>>
>> ajay
> 
> Ajay,
> 
> This will generate major confusion among users of all types and be hard
> to maintain.  A better approach is to get Bob Muenchen's excellent book
> and keep it nearby.
> 
> Frank

I whole heartedly agree with Frank here. It may be one thing to have a
"translation" process in place based upon some form of logical mapping
between the two languages (as Bob's book provides). But is another thing
entirely to actually start writing functions that provide wrappers
modeled on SAS based PROCs.

If you do this, then you only serve to obfuscate the fundamental
philosophical and functional differences between the two languages and
doom a new useR to missing all of R's benefits. They will continue to
try to figure out how to use R based upon their "SAS intuition" rather
than developing a new set of coding and even statistical paradigms.

Having been through the SAS to S/R transition myself, having used SAS
for much of the 90's and now having used R for over 7 years, I can speak
from personal experience and state that the only way to achieve the
requisite proficiency with R is immersion therapy.

Regards,

Marc Schwartz