Date:         Wed, 2 Jul 2008 18:15:54 -0400
Reply-To:     Peter Flom <peterflomconsulting@mindspring.com>
Sender:       "SAS(r) Discussion" <SAS-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
From:         Peter Flom <peterflomconsulting@MINDSPRING.COM>
Subject:      Re: A powerpoint slide show comparing R with SAS and SPSS
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8

Mary wrote
>>As a statistical programmer who also does a lot of data mining work, it
>seems hard to justify the time involved in learning R, unless it was really
>going to take over the industry so that one would have to know R in order to
>get a position; it certainly would not make me more productive in my current
>position, as I can do things in SAS very quickly and also correctly.
>>
>>Although I do have more programming skills than most statistical
>programmers (I was a PowerBuilder developer and also a Transact-SQL
>developer), it is the "thinking in R" that has me wary;  I think in sets,
>and it seems like R people don't think in sets, which seems very strange to
>me in dealing with statistics.  Is R not set oriented like SAS and SQL are?
>>

R is very different from SAS.

I am not sure what you  mean by 'set oriented'.  R is (somewhat) of an object oriented language, and it operates on vectors and matrices with great ease.  One thing about R is that you can often avoid loops, if you're clever.

It's true that R has nothing like a DATA step.... it doesn't have "steps" at all.  Of course, if you write a program in R, it will be much easier if you think in what might be called steps.... but that's true of any programming, isn't it?

Peter

Peter L. Flom, PhD
Statistical Consultant
www DOT peterflom DOT com