This document provides guidelines for effective data visualization. It discusses choosing the correct chart type based on the type of data and story being told, such as comparing categories, showing changes over time, or plotting relationships. Gestalt principles and reducing unnecessary ink are also covered. Examples of strategic, operational, analytical and exhibition dashboards are shown. The document demonstrates techniques in Excel and SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) and provides resources for further learning.
5. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• what’s the story you want to tell?
• choose the correct chart type
• use visual perception wisely
• reduce data/ink ratio
6. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• what’s the story you want to tell?
x y
10 8,04
8 6,95
13 7,58
9 8,81
11 8,33
14 9,96
6 7,24
4 4,26
12 10,84
7 4,82
5 5,68
7. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• different kind of stories
– explanatory: (static) reports / dashboards
• strategic – high level overview
• operational – detail level
– analytical: pivot tables / interactive
visualizations
– exhibition: usually pretty visualizations
8. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• example: strategic dashboard
Information Dashboard Design p. 177 – Stephen Few
9. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• example: operational dashboard
Information Dashboard Design p. 199 – Stephen Few
10. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• example: analytical dashboard
Information Dashboard Design p. 201 – Stephen Few
11. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• example: exhibition
http://www.biodiaspora.com http://seekshreyas.com/beerviz/
12. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• choose the correct chart type
– comparing categories
– bar/column chart, dot plot, Gantt, histogram,
…
13. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• choose the correct chart type
– showing changes over time
– line chart, sparklines, area chart, candlestick
chart, barcode chart…
15. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• choose the correct chart type
– hierarchies and part-to-whole relationships
– pie chart, waffle chart, stacked bars, tree map,
…
18. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• choose the correct chart type
– plotting connections and relationships
– Scatter plot, bubble plot, heat map, network
diagram
19. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• choose the correct chart type
– plotting geo-spatial data
20. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• remember: correlation does not imply
causation
21. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• use visual perception wisely
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22. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• use visual perception wisely
– not all can be used quantitatively
length width orientation shape enclosure
size hue intensity 2D position
23. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• use visual perception wisely
– an example
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:FrancePopulationDe
nsity1968.png
http://www.theusrus.de/blog/the-good-the-bad-
22012/
24. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• Gestalt principles
– principle of proximity
25. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• Gestalt principles
– principle of similarity
26. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• Gestalt principles
– principle of enclosure
27. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• Gestalt principles
– principle of closure/continuity
28. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• reduce data/ink ratio
– remove non-data pixels
• no 3D effects. EVER. No seriously, don’t.
• no backgrounds, shadows or gradients
• remove grid lines, decoration, borders, fill colors
29. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• reduce data/ink ratio
– reduce unnecessary data pixels
• display only what is really needed to tell your story
30. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• reduce data/ink ratio
– highlight most import pixels
34. GUIDELINES ON DATA VISUALIZATION
• what’s the story you want to tell?
• choose the correct chart type
• use visual perception wisely
• reduce data/ink ratio
37. SHOWING OFF WITH SSRS
• to watch: Dataviz you thought you could
not do with SSRS by Jason Thomas
• 24 hours of PASS business analytics edition
• http://www.sqlpass.org/bac/2014/Sessions/
SneakPeeks/Details.aspx?sid=5907
Ask which people of the audience attended my session last year on the community day.
Ask which people have to create visualizations (tables, charts, reports, excel).
Introduce yourself briefly.
Ask the audience: which is better, table or graph? Answer: it depends.
Think about the story/message you want to bring to the person reading your visualization.
Example:
X = metals (price), y = conductivity. Physicist presenting results prefers graph, engineer building a chip wants the table for the exact values.
There are different kinds of visualizations, depending on how you want to deliver information to the end user.
Strategic:
Executive dashboard
High level overview
Limited to no interaction
Not real-time
Analytical:
deeper level of detail
interactions with data
not real-time
more complex
Exposition:
Data itself is less important
“data art”
self-expression through raw data
more emotive
When you decide to use charts to represent data, it is important to consider the correct chart type. Different types of information lead to different types of charts.
DEMO: show how to create sparklines in Excel.
Dangerous type of charts, they are easily misinterpreted/misunderstood.
Stacked bar chart allows easy comparison of the lowest bar, not much for all the others.
Ask audience if the yellow slice is bigger or smaller than one quarter.
Avoid the use of 3D; this makes it only worse.
Guidelines for pie charts: sort by size, start at 12 o’clock and not too many slices.
Only plot on a world map if you can get relevant insights from it. Otherwise just use a bar chart
Normalize per 1000 people!
Some attributes can be processed pre-attentively, e.g. without thinking about it. (thanks to evolution)
The following can be used quantitatively:
Length, width (limited), size (limited), intensity (limited) and 2D position.
Comes from the Gestalt school of psychology. Gestalt means pattern and there are certain principles in how we tend to group objects in certain ways.