I am studying program writing style. One of the best practices that comes out of these studies is programming standards and in my programming we tend to use structured style that repeats from project to project, so that our coders who are less able to know programming syntax can follow along and be productive.

I write in SAS everyday at work. I often document my SAS code as I write it. I also often spend dedicated time writing comments and documenting as part of overall project time. But this needs to happen for any computer language writing not just statistics programming with SAS.

I started studying knowledge management long after studying good computer programing writing. Early on I learned to sketch out computer programs before starting to write on punch cards or at the keyboard. It was expected that one started with pencil and paper. Learning why we need good documentation is often communicated by saying, "What if you were't here to run the programs what would we need to know?". Only then does the topic of computer programming fit in with knowledge management.

I have worked for a well know demography expert as a code checker where I reviewed SAS logs for possible errors. He taught me some techniques for documenting variables. I have started to discuss with him his allowing me to describe his techniques in my book on documenting SAS programs. I am hoping to devote a whole chapter to the "hows" and best practices for documenting variables.