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Readings in
Information Visualisation
Research papers on the latest developments in graphic presentation - largely from Xerox PARC
This is a collection of 'forty-seven classic or cutting edge papers' on information visualisation in one, two, and three dimensional space; on dynamic and interactive mapping; and on new devices such as the 'document lens' which allows readers to view files simultaneously in outline and detail. The editors claim that their compilation 'defines the emerging field of information visualization and offers the first-ever collection of the classic papers of the discipline, with introductions and analytical discussions of each topic and paper.'
The papers themselves are still in the raw academic form of Abstract, Keywords, Introduction, Problem, Solution, Summary, Discussion, and References - but they are profusely (if unevenly) illustrated, sometimes in full colour. In terms of its own presentation, the collection is a riot of different fonts, type sizes, and even page orientation, but it's well bound, with a full index and a wonderfully huge bibliography.
The majority of the studies have computer graphics and display as a given - maybe because this is now seen as a medium in which information can be most dynamically treated. As the editors claim:
"it now looks like cyberspace may evolve into the one net where most information resides. It will be overwhelmingly large. Information visualisation could play a crucial role in taming this space."
In terms of practical applications, the range is astonishing. There are some marvellous diagrams - three-dimensional charts of activity on the Tokyo stock exchange and zoom-in-zoom-out pages of office documentation from Xerox, plus some visualisations using interactive 3D animations.
Having just grappled with the problem of designing a web site map, I found the section on information trees particularly interesting, something they refer to as - 'a space-filling approach to the visualisation of hierarchical information structures'. There's even one study on data visualization sliders (searching for James Bond films) and visualising personal life histories, which might be quite important, given the recent controversy regarding the genetic data-base problem in Iceland.
There's no point in pretending: this is a very advanced and theoretical collection of papers which is aimed at researchers and professional scientist-designers in industry and the academic world. It's full of mathematical formulae and diagrams, and has been largely written and edited by people from the Xerox Palo Alto Research Centre - which is described by Robert Cringeley in his Accidental Empires as a 'Valhallah' for designers - 'because that's where the most of the computer technology we'll use for the rest of the century was invented'.
© Roy Johnson 1999
[more DESIGN books]
Stuart K. Card, Jock D. Mackinlay and Ben Shneiderman, Readings in Information Visualization - Using Vision to Think, San Francisco: Morgan Kaufmann, 1999, pp.606, ISBN 1558605339
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