What I learned from my favorite paper at SAS Global Forum
At first, I was thinking it wasn’t right to have a favorite paper, but then I realized that was idiotic. It’s not like these papers (or their presenters) are my children.
My favorite paper was,
Statistical modeling for large complex data: Five new directions from SAS/STAT software
If you’re not a statistician, props to you for reading after that first sentence, especially since some of the lessons apply to any conference.
- You don’t always have to present or attend presentations on whatever is shiny and new. The techniques he presented, like GLMSELECT, a method for selecting the best model is not brand new. I remember when it was first added to SAS/STAT and thinking it was a way cool idea I should use – but, then, I didn’t. As you can see from the graph above, it can be pretty easy to select the best model. Looks a lot like a scree plot, doesn’t it? This also further supports my point that visual displays of data, like the one above, are everywhere and taking over. Now that I have been reminded of its existence, I’m looking for a use for it so I can really remember it. Unfortunately, this is a method for general linear models and what I am most interested in right now has a binomial outcome, whether a player finished a game or not.
- Don’t stop learning when you go home. I remembered that there was also an example in this paper that used HPGENSELECT for generalized linear models, including binomial distributions. So, I am going to try that out with this dataset. One of the areas where I am improving is actually reading all of those papers I mean to get around to when I get home. Whether it is a paper you attended, but is now jumbled around in your brain with the other 25 sessions, or one you could not attend because it conflicted with something else, when you get home, you should read it. Conferences can be expensive and you want to get the most out of that time and money you spent.
- Of course, I learned about sparse regression, quantile regression, classification and regression trees and more, which you can, too if you follow my advice from #2.
Okay, well there is a lot more to say about SAS Global Forum and my adventures with HPGENSELECT but we have a new game, Forgotten Trail, coming out for sale tomorrow, so back to work.
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