1D Linear
This type of data include: (basically text that is sequencial)
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textual documents
program source code
lists of textual information
Issues to consider when designing for this type of data:
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fonts and styles; (colors, size etc...)
overview; (which type can we use)
scrolling; (which type can we use)
selection methods; (which type can we use)
This figure display the whole system source code.
Color coding is used to provide information about the thousands of lines of the system.
Here the newest lines are in red and the oldest in blue.
1D Linear - Continued
This figure shows another exemple of textual information vizualization.
In this case colors are used to mark the differences between versions of code (visual
sdiff...)
2D Linear
This type of data include:
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geographic maps;
floorplans;
newspaper layout;
Issues to consider when designing for thi s type of data:
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may use multiple 2D-layers;
ease of finding adjacent items;
ease of establishing paths
A map of Germany :
This figure shows a 2D map
3D World
This type of data include:
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items with volume;
items with complex relationship
Issues to consider when designing for this type of data:
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positioning;
orientation;
occlusion; (some items may be hidden by others)
Web Forager
In this figure the www is presented to the user as a desktop in order to match the speed of
interacting with any documents with the speed of manipulating a real piece of paper from
a desk. The idea here is to allow users to group pages into books and manipulate them as
a whole.
Temporal
(Specifc task by users: finding items with relation to time attributes)
This type of data include:
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timelines (medical records, project management, historical representations)
Exemples of applications: video system edition, animation preparation, etc...
LifeLine
Multi-Dimensional
(Specifc task by users: finding patterns, clusters, correlations among pairs of variables,
gaps and outliers)
This type of data include:
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relational data;
statistical data;
Issues to consider when designing for this type of data:
may be difficult for users to comprehend the multidimensional representation.
Spotfire Flash demo (if possible run the demo)
This figure shows that a multidimensional set of data is extracted from Excel
Multi-Dimensional - Continued
The same data represented visually.
The lines connect the specific plants reaction to one compound
Multi-Dimensional - Continued
Trees
(Specifc task by users: the seven basic tasks may be applied to the links between items eg "which directories are a sub-directory of...")
This type of data include:
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items presenting a
relationship with a parent
item;
Issues to consider when
designing for this type of data:
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breadth;
depth;
This figure shows a directory listing taken from Explorer
It also include treemaps where for exemple the files on a drive occupies space on the
display proportional to their size and the color is related to the type of the file
Networks
(Specifc task by users: knowledge about the shortest or least costly path connecting 2
items)
This type of data include:
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items presenting a relationship with an arbitrary number of other items;
Issues to consider when designing for this type of data:
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complexity of the relationships between items;
user's task;
Network data representation from Bell Labs
This figure shows the majors routers in the Internet network
Networks - Continued
This figure shows the most densely-used paths for long-distance phone calls between
countries. - arcs
Networks - Continued
This is another figure that shows the most densely-used paths for long-distance phone
calls from USA - helix
Networks - Continued
This is a different figure showing again the most densely-used paths for long-distance
phone calls from USA - pincushion
Tasks involved in Visualization - Bis
The seven basic tasks possible by a user:
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Overview
Zoom
Filter
Details-on-demand
Relate
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History
Extract
Overview task
Gain an overview of the entire collection of the information.
Zoom task
Zoom in on items of interest.
Smooth zooming helps users preserve their sense of position and context.
From GulaSidorna
Filter task
Take out the uninteresting items.
The goal is to give users easy controls with rapid display updates, no matter the amount
of data presented.
From the Spotfire Flash demo:
The figure shows the scrollbar allowing to select one single compound for filtering.
Filter task - Continued
This figure shows that by manipulating the various scrollbars related to reaction of each
type of plant to compounds it is possible to filter out unwanted data.
Details-on-demand task
Select an item or a group and get more details when needed, once the entire collection
has been reduced to a few items.
From the Spotfire Flash demo:
This figure shows that once a set of item is extracted, detail-on-demand is available for
further manipulation.
Relate task
View relationship among items.
By varying the value of one attribute at the time, the information being displayed
consider of only the items whose value for this attribute matches a certain relationship.
SDM - Selective Dynamic Manipulation
This figure shows a data set where color indicate a relationship between items according
to a parameter previously choosen.
History task
Keep a history of actions to support undo, replay, and progressive refinement.
Why? Because it is vary rare that a single action produces the desired output.
Extract task
Allow extraction of subcollections and the query of parameters, either for further analysis
or for saving separately. Even to drag-drop the subset into another application for further
processing.
This figure shows how related items are extracted visually while preserving the
relationships (size) between elements
This figure shows the next step of the extraction
Extract task - Continued
This figure shows a different way of performing the visualization of the extraction.
Also check the Shockwaved demo of Visage
Cognition and Visualization - Quickly!
With respect to the congnitive theory seen at the beginning of this course, the following
concept are involved in visualization:
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Attention
Abstraction
Affordances
Attention
Learning complex-query languages or complex information coding rules is distracting,
and prevents users to focus on their information needs.
Users need to have:
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simple menus;
direct-manipulation;
simple visual coding rules;
easily understandable metaphor
appealing appearance
meaningful animation
sense of location/position
Abstraction
Abstract-information (statistical data, etc...) visualization reveals patterns, gaps, clusters
or outliers.
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Proximity/relationships between items should emerge
Group of elements