| SAS is a procedural third-generational programming language, based on C. It was developed by a team of agricultural staticians in the early 1960s, who ultimately saw the commercial value of their product as a tool for providing business intelligence solutions. In 1976 they incorporated a company also called SAS and it became the world's largest privately held software company, and they have been producing several innovative software packages since.
SAS (the company) is famous for offering its employees a 35 hour work week.
However apparently most users are not interested in using the more obscure statistical features of SAS; rather they are attracted to its ability to manipulate, sort and compare data sets reasonably quickly. It also has a syntax that is very easy to forget, meaning that SAS programmers are forever having to code with a ten kilogram manual on their laps, trying to find the PRINT command amongst instructions on binomially distributing variables in Sumerian year format. | 
