SAS Companion for the Microsoft Windows Environment

Customizing Your SAS Session

This section gives you information about how you can customize your SAS session to how you like to work. The SAS windowing environment can be customized in several ways: from the Options pull-down menu, from the Preferences dialog box, and by using SAS system options.

Selecting Fonts

To choose a different font or point size for text in SAS windows, select the Tools pull-down menu and then select Options and Fonts..., which displays the Font dialog box. The fonts available depend on what monospace fonts you have installed under Windows. For example, you might have the Courier font and System font available. When you select a font or point size, the Font Sample field displays a sample of the font you have selected.

When you install SAS, the Setup program automatically installs a TrueType font, named SAS Monospace, designed specifically for use with SAS. This font, in combination with the Sasfont display font, ensures that tabular output is formatted properly whether you view it in the Output window, print it, or copy it to another Windows application.

By default, SAS uses the SAS Monospace font to produce printed output. In addition, any text that you cut, copy, or drag from a SAS window to paste into another Windows application will be formatted with the SAS Monospace font.

You cannot use the Fonts item to select SAS/GRAPH fonts.

CAUTION:: Beware of changing certain display characteristics on low-resolution displays. If you select large font sizes on some monitors, you may not be able to see all the text in your SAS windows at one time. In some windows, such as the SAS/ASSIST window where there are no scroll bars, large font sizes can cause some choices to be invisible. For these types of displays, large font sizes are not recommended. This same problem can occur if you change the Windows Appearance properties and select a window border thickness of a thick size. On low-resolution displays, you should not use thick window borders.

Setting Session Preferences

You can configure your SAS session to accommodate the way that you like to work. For example:

You can use a movable command box instead of the command bar.
You can set preferences for scrolling behavior and window appearance.
You can set a preferred Web browser to use when viewing internet Web pages or HTML output.

To customize your SAS session, select the Tools pull-down menu, and then select Options, and Preferences. The Preferences dialog box (shown in Preferences Dialog Box (showing the General tab)) contains different pages that separate the session settings into different categories. Click on the tabs that are located along the top of the dialog box to navigate to the settings that you want to change, and then select the options that you want. When you are finished, click on [OK]. The options that you select are saved from session to session in the PREFWSAV.WSAVE entry in your SASUSER.PROFILE catalog.

Preferences Dialog Box (showing the General tab)

[IMAGE]

The following sections describe each page (or tab) of the Preferences dialog box and how to use these settings to control your SAS session.

Customizing Windows Positions

In the default display configuration of an interactive session (shown in The Main SAS Window) the main SAS window displays the Explorer and Results windows as docked windows, and the Log, Program Editor, and Output windows in the remaining SAS workspace.

Using the Windows menu, you can position SAS windows in the same manner as other Windows applications: Restore All Windows, Cascade, Tile, and Resize. While the default display configuration is sufficient for efficient SAS System use, you may want to open a few more windows for easy access and rearrange the windows on your display. For instance, you may want the My Favorites window open, but minimized, with the windows arranged in a mosaic pattern so you can see all of them at once. To accomplish this, you click on the minimize button in the window title bar for the My Favorites window and then select Tile from the Windows menu.

The resulting main SAS window is displayed in Customized SAS Session:

Customized SAS Session

[IMAGE]

In addition, you can undock windows so that all windows can be positioned where you would like. For more information on the docking view, see Using the Docking View.

For more information about SAS commands that have aspects specific to Windows, see SAS Commands under Windows .

Changing the Window Colors

Changing the color of window components is a shared responsibility of Windows and the SAS System. You change the color of most standard window parts by changing the Properties of the Windows desktop.

Several window element colors are controlled by the SAS System (such as the color of error message text in the Log). To change a window component that is controlled by the SAS System, either type SASCOLOR in the command bar or select

Tools Options Colors...
The SASCOLOR window lets you choose the colors to use for specific elements. For more information about the SASCOLOR window, see the SAS online Help for the window.

Customizing Your SAS Session with System Options

Several SAS system options are available to control the windowing environment within the SAS System. The most commonly used options are the following:

AWSDEF: specifies the location and dimensions of the main SAS window when the SAS System initializes.
AWSTITLE: specifies the text for the main SAS window title bar.
FONT: specifies a font name and point size to use as the default SAS session font.
ICON: minimizes the SAS window when the SAS System initializes.
REGISTER: enables you to add applications to the main SAS window Tools pull-down menu so you can execute them by clicking on their names.
SPLASHLOC and NOSPLASH: specifies the location of the logo screen (SPLASHLOC) to display at the start of a SAS session, or suppresses the logo screen (NOSPLASH).
USERICON: specifies user-defined icons to be incorporated into SAS/AF applications.

These system options can be specified in your SAS configuration file or in the SAS command. Some are also valid in an OPTIONS statement. For details on the syntax of these options and on where you can specify them, see SAS System Options under Windows.

Changing the Size and Placement of the Main SAS Window

The AWSDEF system option enables you to control the placement and size of the main SAS window when the SAS System initializes. Suppose you want your SAS session always to occupy the upper-left quarter of your display. To accomplish this, specify the following AWSDEF option in your SAS configuration file:

-awsdef 0 0 50 50

For more information about the AWSDEF system option, see AWSDEF.

Changing the Title of Your SAS Session

By default, the main SAS title bar contains the text SAS. If you want a different title, you can use the AWSTITLE system option. For example, to set the title to My SAS Session, specify the following option in your SAS configuration file:

-awstitle "My SAS Session"

Minimizing Your SAS Session

The ICON system option causes the SAS System to be minimized at invocation. If you are running a batch job, you might want to use this system option to save space on your display.

Adding Applications to the Tools Menu

The REGISTER system option enables you to add names of applications to the Tools pull-down menu of the main SAS window. You can execute one of these applications by clicking on its name. The REGISTER system option takes as arguments a menu name and an operating system command or a path specification for an executable file. You can also specify a working folder. For more information about the REGISTER system option, see REGISTER.

The following is an example that adds a command to print the contents of the SAS folder:

-register "Contents of SAS" 
          "dir c:\program files\sas"

When you click on Contents of SAS in the Tools pull-down menu, the output of the Windows DIR command is displayed in a command prompt window.

The following is an example of adding an .EXE file to the menu along with a specification of a working folder of C:\EXDATA:

-register "Excel" "excel.exe" "c:\exdata"

This adds Excel to the menu. When you click on Excel, the file EXCEL.EXE is invoked.

Note: The REGISTER system option is valid only as an invocation option (that is, in a SAS configuration file or in the SAS invocation command). [cautend]

Displaying a Custom Logo Screen during SAS System Invocation

To display your own logo when the SAS System starts:

Create the logo that you want to display and save it either as a Windows bitmap (which has a BMP file extension), or compile it as resource and build it into a DLL.
When you invoke SAS, specify the -SPLASHLOC system option with the full pathname of the file that contains your bitmap. If the bitmap is in a DLL, be sure to specify the resource number as well. The default resource number is 1.
For example, suppose your logo screen is stored in C:\MYBMPS\SPLASH.BMP. You would specify the SPLASHLOC system option like this:
```
-splashloc c:\mybmps\splash.bmp
```
If your logo was stored in C:\MYDLLS\OPENING.DLL as resource 101, you would specify the SPLASHLOC system option like this:
```
-splashloc c:\mydlls\opening.dll 101
```
For more information about the SPLASHLOC system option, see SPLASHLOC.

Adding User-Defined Icons to the SAS System

The USERICON system option enables you to add your own icons to the SAS System. These icons can be used with SAS/AF and SAS/EIS applications. The syntax for the USERICON system option is as follows:

-USERICON icon-resource-file number-of-icons

The icon-resource-file argument specifies the full path to a dynamic link library (DLL) file that contains the user icons. The number-of-icons argument specifies the number of icons found in the resource file. For example, the following system option specifies that there are four icons located in an icon resource file named ICONS.DLL found in the C:\JUNK folder:

-usericon c:\junk\icons.dll 4

The DLL that is used as the icon resource file must be created using the Win32 Software Development Kit (and must therefore be 32-bit). For more information about how to build a resource file, refer to the documentation for the Microsoft Win32 Software Development Kit.

You can incorporate icons into your SAS/AF and SAS/EIS applications using a FRAME entry. For more information, refer to the SAS online Help for SAS/AF software and SAS/EIS software.

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