Installing a terminal server on Microsoft Windows Server

The below blog post will show you how to install make a Microsoft Windows Server a Terminal Server. This was done on a Microsoft Windows Server 2019 Datacenter.

A Terminal Server makes it possible for multiple users to access a Windows Server through Remote Desktop (also called RDP). A normal Windows Server installation is limited to two (2) multiple users.

First off you need to get Terminal Services installed on the Windows Server if this is not already installed.

1.
To do this you need to start Windows PowerShell as an administrator and execute the command below.

Command: Install-WindowsFeature RDS-RD-Server -IncludeManagementTools

2.
Then you need to set the license server under in the Local Group Policy Editor. This is done from the Edit Group Policy located in the Control Panel.

Go to Computer Configuration\Administrative Templates\Windows Components\Remote Desktop Services\Remote Desktop Session Host\Licensing

And choose Use the specified Remote Desktop license servers to set the server.

Here you need to insert the license server provided.

3.
Then you need to set the license mode under in the Local Group Policy Editor. This is done from the Edit Group Policy located in the Control Panel.

Go to Computer Configuration\Administrative Templates\Windows Components\Remote Desktop Services\Remote Desktop Session Host\Licensing

And choose Set the Remote Desktop licensing mode

Here you most likely want to choose Per User

SAS libname for Oracle

Below SAS-code shows how to make a libname for Oracle directly in SAS-code by providing information about the Oracle server, that you want to access.

libname <YOUR CHOICE> oracle user=<USERNAME> pw=<PASSWORD> Schema=<SCHEMA ON ORACLE>
path="(DESCRIPTION =
(ADDRESS = (PROTOCOL = TCP)(HOST = <NAME/IP-ADRESSE OF ORACLE SERVER)(PORT = <PORT FOR ORACLE SERVER. DEFAULT ORACLE PORT IS 1539))
(CONNECT_DATA =
(SERVER = DEDICATED)
(SERVICE_NAME = <DATABASE ON ORACLE SERVER>))
)";

Scanning all SAS-programs on server

The commands below will scan all *.sas files and look for the text proc. It will of course be possible to use any other string instead of proc. This scenario can be used to scan all your SAS-programs for the usage of SAS-procedures. Be aware that you need to be administrator or run the command as administrator to have access to all folders.

Linux
It will scan from the root of a server and go recursively through all the subfolders it encounters. It will pipe the result of the scan to the file linuxsasproc.txt in the folder where you start the execution of the command – this can of course be changed if you want to.

grep --include=\*.sas -rinw '/' -e 'proc' > linuxsasproc.txt

NB! The –include has two – -.

Output in linuxsasproc.txt. The file is delimited by : (colon)
<Location of SAS-program containing the search string>:<Line number in the file where the search string is found>:<The line that includes the search string>

Example
/sas/sasprogram.sas:24:proc sql;

Addition
In Linux I found that the command find has a maxdepth-option. This option makes it possible to decide, how far down a folder hierarchy a search should be preformed.
For example -maxdepth 1 will not search subfolders. This means that the command below will only search for files (-type f) in all folders matching  the folders with wildcard ./sasjobs/runningtime_*/ – but not subfolders of these folders.

find ./sasjobs/runningtime_*/ -maxdepth 1 -type f > result.txt

Windows
It will scan through all subfolder from the location where you start the program. It will pipe the result of the scan to the file winsasproc.txt in the folder where you start the execution of the command – this can of course be changed if you want to.

findstr /s /i proc *.sas > winsasproc.txt

NB! Be aware, that the DOS-commando findstr has an ‘Out of Memory‘ flaw.
Therefore, it can be better to use PowerShell, if this is available for you. The PowerShell command can look something like the below

Get-ChildItem -Path <PATH TO SCAN>:\*.sas -Recurse | Select-String -Pattern 'PROC' | Out-File "<FILE TO CONTAIN OUTPUT>"

An example below

Get-ChildItem -Path C:\*.sas -Recurse | Select-String -Pattern 'PROC' | Out-File "C:\output\sasscanoutput.csv"

Output in winssasproc.txt. The file is delimited by : (colon)
<Location of SAS-program containing the search string>:<The line that includes the search string>

Example
Documents\sasprogram.sas:proc sql;

Using TNSPING to get info about Oracle server

The command TNSPING can be used to get information about an alias for an Oracle server. Below you can see a screenshot from the command being executed in the command prompt for Windows.

In the command prompt you write: tnsping <the alias of your Oracle server>

TNSPING will return the

HOST Showing you the name of the physical host of the Oracle server.
PORT Showing you the port of the Oracle server on the physical host.
1521 is the default port for an Oracle server.

Get CSV-file from SAS to Excel PowerPivot

To get the correct formatting of a CSV-file from SAS to import into Excel PowerPivot, it’s possible to use the CSV ODS-tagset (https://documentation.sas.com/?docsetId=odsug&docsetTarget=n0jrwo0xyh8nlqn19u6uvrgx63gc.htm&docsetVersion=9.4&locale=en) and do a PROC PRINT of the dataset into an CSV-file.

ods csv file="ODS_CSV.csv";
   proc print data=sashelp.class;
   run;
ods csv close;

I have found that this will do the correct formatting of text in “ “.

Using MSSQL TEMPDB in SAS

You can use the TEMPDB in Microsoft SQL-server through SAS by creating a ODBC-libname – like the libname below.

libname TMPLIB ODBC NOPROMPT="DRIVER=SQL Server; SERVER=<SERVERNAME>; DATABASE=TEMPDB; TRUSTED_CONNECTION=yes" schema=DBO CONNECTION=SHARED;

It’s important to provide the option CONNECTION=SHARED or else it will not work.

Through the libname it’s now possible to write and read from TEMPDB. The dataset has to have this syntax ‘#<DATASETNAME>’n e.g. like below ‘#temp’n

data tmplib.'#temp'n;
set sashelp.class;
run;

Be aware, that you are not able to view this new table through the Display Manager in SAS. When Microsoft SQL-server names the table, it makes the table name longer than SAS is able to display in the Display Manager.
You’re able to verify that the table do exist through SSMS (SQL Server Management Studio), or you can verify it’s existence by reading it back to SAS by using the code below.

proc sql;
create table temp as
select *
from tmplib.'#temp'n
;
quit;

If you want to use MSSQL-server temp-tables in Pass-Through SQL in SAS, then you need to use the libname option dbmstemp=yes.
Using this option will make it possible to execute the code below and force SAS to use the MSSQL-server to process the SQL-code in the pass-through SQL. If the option dbmstemp=yes is not used, then SAS will pull the data from the MSSQL-server back to be executed locally on the SAS-installation. It works with the below driver.

libname tmplib odbc noprompt="driver=odbc driver 11 for sql server; server=<servername>; database=tempdb; trusted_connection=yes" schema=dbo connection=shared dbmstemp=yes;

data tmplib.<SASTEMP-tablename>;
set <tablename>;
run;

proc sql noprint;
connect to odbc (noprompt="driver=odbc driver 11 for sql server; server=<servername>; trusted_connection=yes");
create table <tablename> as
select * from connection to odbc
(
select a.*
from <tablename> a
inner join tempdb.##<SASTEMP-tablename> b on a.<variable> = b.<variable>
);
disconnect from odbc;
quit;

Further information can be found in this link: http://support.sas.com/documentation/cdl/en/acreldb/63647/HTML/
default/viewer.htm#a002677192.htm

 

Extending the Display Manager in SAS

The commands below can be used to expand the Display Manager in SAS.

Command Description
vt &syslast.; Add to keys, e.g. F5. This opens a Viewtable with the latest run dataset/view.
next viewtable:; end; Add to keys, e.g. F9. Then F9 closes the last used table (that is open). Can close all views with multiple F9’s.
odsresults; select all; clear; wpgm; Add to keys, e.g. SHIFT F1. This key bind clears all SAS “results” and returns to the program editor.
log; clear; wpgm; Add to keys, e.g. F4. Clears log without having to highlight the log window. Returns to the program editor.