VizWorld.com

YellowFin has a short article on “Best practices” For data analysis and visualization in the Business Intelligence space, and they make a somewhat surprising (and correct) statement that too many people get stuck trying to make flashy and dazzling graphics, forgetting that they’re supposed to be useful before pretty.

Not only can this modern addiction to the sleek and sometimes superficial affect the initial purchase decision, this mindset can place corporate data analysis in a long-term straitjacket. Users of all types will be tempted to dazzle colleagues and clients with impressive looking 3D multi-pie charts and animated graphs to the detriment of the data analysis – The chart, rather than the data, becomes the star of the show. For best practice data analysis, the visualization of that data should only support and facilitate understanding, never distract or detract from it.

This is a trend that’s furthered even more by the constant deluge of infographics that keep popping up around the net.  Rather than condensing mountains of information into a simple understandable image, many of them take one or two sentences and turn it into a 5-screen tall 4Meg image.

via Data analysis & data visualization best practices for Business Intelligence (P1).

Graphics bi, yellowfin

YellowFin has some new interactive visualizations up on their site as part of a new Blog posting that chronicles the damaging effects of war through some interesting visualizations.  Specifically, they look at life expectancy during several turbulent periods around the world to see how it varies. During periods of violent unrest (civil war, etc) you can see visible drops.

The 70s was a devastating and infamous time in Cambodia’s history, where at its lowest point in 1975/76, the average life expectancy plummeted to 33 years of age. It began when Prince Sihanouk was removed from power in 1970 by a right-wing US-backed military coup. Sihanouk joined forces with Pol Pot to oppose the new military government. In the same year, the US also invaded Cambodia in an attempt to stamp out the strong North Vietnamese presence along the Cambodian border.

via Data analysis & data visualization highlight war’s impact on life exp..

Science interactive, war, yellowfin