VizWorld.com

Infographics are everywhere these days (VizWorld included), and seem to serve multiple purposes ranging from educating the public to simply directing eyeballs for advertising dollars.  So many infographics seem to fall into that latter category that the entire field is beginning to develop a bad reputation for simply overcomplicating trivial data with splash but pointless visuals.  Robert Kosara has a new article online that reminds us that good infographics do exist, and provides a few tips on how to keep your own graphics from becoming internet fodder.

Perhaps the most obvious use of infographics is giving readers a sense of scale. This is a very typical use in magazine and newspaper articles, where the purpose of the infographic is to provide some perspective on the numbers mentioned in an article.

via The Fascinating World of Good Infographics | EagerEyes.org.

Science cell, infographic

Everyone’s favorite OpenGL Software emulator has just released a v7.5 for development.  Big feature in this release is the new “Gallium3D” infrastructure with support for Intel 915/945 and Cell.  They’ve also added support for a few new OpenGL Extensions (framebuffer objects, vertex_arrays in bgra, etc) and improved a few quirks in the GLSL compiler.

Remember, it’s a development release so you won’t want to try this on anything too critical yet, but it’s a great preview of what’s to come.

Mesa Release Notes.

Science cell, library, mesa, software

A new report from Francisco Ortigosa, Repsol YPF talks about the problems oil and gas companies have visualizing data from the bottom of the ocean, particularly the US Gulf of Mexico.  Their solution?  Combining the Mare Nostrum supercomputer with Cell Processors (just like the PS3 or the RoadRunner) to create the “Kaleidoscope Project”.

The Kaleidoscope Project encompasses a simultaneous innovation of hardware and software to achieve a petascale solution to seismic imaging using off-the-shelf technology. Software research focuses on the quality of algorithms and avoids shortcuts or tradeoffs common because of lack of computing power. Kaleidoscope is to ensure the maximum possible imaging quality regardless of the computer power required. And of course speed and power, which are the two main factors for the project to succeed, are guaranteed while ensuring low cost because it’s coming from a massive market.

via Seismic visualization supercomputer brings subsalt data into the light.

Science cell, gpgpu, hpc, ibm, oil&gas, sony