VIEWS 2003 Conference Report

After missing 2002, the VIEWS Conference was reinstated to the conference calendar at the Commonwealth Conference & Events Centre in Kensington on May 20. The Exhibition Hall held the VIEWS Committee desk (which doubled as the Technical Question & Answer desk), the SAS Books-by-Users stand, and 7 sponsored stands from Aim Resourcing, Amadeus Software, Futrix, IMAJ Consulting, Mango Solutions, Oxford Pharmaceutical Sciences, and Statistical Tabling Services. The 3 seminar rooms allowed 245 delegates from 117 companies to watch 21 speakers present 35 technical SAS papers, and, apart from the Hunt Room initially living up to its name and the occasional showers, I only heard praise for the venue and conference as a whole on the day.

At the end of the day the Best Paper Award of £250 was won by Graham Murray. It was also announced that the VIEWS Committee were very happy with the support from delegates and sponsors, and the range and quality of the papers presented, and are now planning a 3-day conference for 2004 from 19-21 May at the same venue.

The VIEWS 2004 Conference is dependent on user papers being submitted. With the announcement of next year's provisional date now, you have almost 12 months to write your papers and presentations for 2004. It must also be emphasised that, while the conference will be held in London and VIEWS is a UK SAS User Group, we welcome presenters from Europe and the rest of the World.

2003 has been a good year, and the VIEWS Committee would like to make 2004 even better!

.... Philip R Holland (Newsletter Editor)