Sample of Weekly Status Report for Long-Term SAS Consulting Engagement

Hours worked:    32 

Work this week:

·          I provided two more sample pdfs of section classpops to Client in response to questions from last week. The main change in these reports is that the SAS ETL process now filters Oracle section classpops records to only pull terms that are associated with snapshots. The other changes include adding a 'snapshot group' field and (at least for now) placing it as the top column header. We need to discuss the sort order of this item and other aesthetics on the report. I'm also filtering the snapshot date based on a time of 20 minutes after midnight. I may change this to be 23:59:59 after midnight. 

·          After some back-and-forth with Client I agreed to calculate age in the SAS ETL for the student program extract. 

·          There was some back-and forth about reach-through. Client expressed a desire to suppress reach-through for small populations on things like age and also wants to exclude sensitive kpi's (like age) from the reach-through. We discussed reach-through a bit on the call but probably need more discussion. We tentatively talked about a two-map approach, one with and one without reach-through enabled. 

·          I did a brief viewing of the student program extract and wrote a very basic ETL process, similar to the one from section class pops. I regularly get a sas error: "Invalid Sequence Of Commands" when reading the Oracle student_program view even with the most basic data step (proc sql and drag/drop work fine). I'm looking at the SAS support web site for resolution. I can use a workaround if need-be.  

·          Late last week I began to experience an Oracle connection error. After some back-and-forth, it was determined that the ods2d database had been taken down - nobody realized that I was still using it to connect to tgenr via a dblink. Later that day xxxxx was brought back up and I should now have the access I need to go straight to yyyy. 

·          Per our request, I was given access to RDP to a server with IE6 installed (the server's name is zzzzzz). It works fine except my RDP access to Server1 and Server2 were removed. Some of the access (only the current account - no sasdemo) was restored to Server1 and Server2. After some rejiggering of how I sign on and where I store programs, I am properly set up again. 

·          I’ve worked to get a web-conference set up to demo the new reports. After some pondering of any way that would work (considering VPN, RDP and WRS issues), I’ve set up a new Webex account and will use it for demos, at least for now. The new Webex account is only good for 14 days unless we renew the free trial for $39 per month. 

·          I presented a Webex-based demo to client usersl on Thursday. I showed the basic section classpops report and showed them how to navigate WRS. 

·          I provided a link to WRS and access to the new report. We’ve agreed that Client will only check out the new report after 2:30 PST to allow me to work on the cube if need be earlier in the day. 

·          I posed some detailed questions on variable names and report labels (Section Type, Delivery Method, etc.) to Michael/Cheryl. I’ve gotten some partial responses.

 

Work next week: 

  • I will apply changes to the section classpops cube if Client makes the name changes (above) to the underlying Oracle view. 

  • I will also do further work on the student program ETL and work on the cube/map/report for student program. I will employ a work around (if need be) for the ‘Invalid Sequence of Commands’ error message occurring in SAS when I read the student program table.