Measure and Indicator Web-Based Visualization System
Alex Baumann | University of Massachusetts Lowell |
Mary Beth Smrtic | University of Massachusetts Lowell |
Andy Dufilie | University of Massachusetts Lowell |
William Mass | University of Massachusetts Lowell |
Georges Grinstein | University of Massachusetts Lowell |
Published: October, 2009
Full article |
Summary of the Tool
The University of Massachusetts Lowell leads a software development effort to support members of the Open Indicators Consortium with new techniques for data selection, analysis, presentation, and visualization.
The paper linked to above discusses a specific software system designed together with consortium members (CMs) to visualize geographical data. During the development of these systems, the consortium members made several interesting discoveries about their own regions.
Summary of the Impacts
The consortium member’s datasets have differing levels of accuracy and completeness. The members were surprised at how useful our tools have been in pointing out data errors that may otherwise have gone unnoticed.
Data visualization was new to many of the CMs and most had not seen their own data visualized before. Some were familiar with Excel, or had websites with static choropleth maps, but were excited to be able to explore their own data dynamically. The new tools allowed the CMs to gain two main insights; first that their data was often neither clean nor complete, and second, that additional data or more complete data would provide much more impact.