Updated- Tammi Kay George has given an extensive answer to the questions posed –
While SAS Institute is going ahead with plans to launch SAS/IML with R integration, the questions that should be in the minds of people familiar to R and SAS are-
1) Will SAS Institute share revenue with package developers.
2) Would R Core stick to strategy of favouring REvolution Computing over other R application providers. or the R community to an anti-SAS strategy.
3) Would academics and students be better off or more confused than before.
4) Will this help restrict R ‘s brand perception to just a matrix level program or Will this help R gain more enterprise acceptance.
5) What about legal questions of GPL source sode sharing.
So many questions. So little time.
Screenshot- Existing SAS/IML Studio Page
Citation-http://www.sas.com/technologies/analytics/statistics/iml/index.html#section=3
Greetings Ajay: Thanks for the questions. Since July, SAS has offered an interface to R through SAS/IML Studio (formerly SAS Stat Studio). SAS provides customers with the ability to submit R code from within the SAS environment. Developers of statistical models, for example, have more options to derive value from their data – using the breadth of methods already available in SAS while experimenting with new methods not yet implemented in SAS via the R interface. We are not incorporating R code or R packages into SAS software. Rather we are providing an interface to R via SAS/IML Studio to help customers – including academics and students – have a more streamlined programming experience. This will make it easier for folks to work within SAS and call their R code. (Here’s a link to the SAS press rlease about the SAS/IML Studio and R interface http://www.sas.com/news/prereleases/RintegrationSGF09.html ) Many thanks for the opportunity to help clarify, Tammi Kay George, Technology Product Marketing, SAS
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