|
|
| Line 1: |
Line 1: |
| == Aufgabenstellung ==
| |
| [http://ieg.ifs.tuwien.ac.at/~gschwand/teaching/infovis_ue_ws08/infovis_ue_aufgabe2.html Beschreibung der Aufgabe 2]
| |
|
| |
|
| === Zu beurteilende Tabelle ===
| |
|
| |
| [[Image:Statistics308.jpg]]
| |
|
| |
| == Critics on the table ==
| |
| Following the Table Design Guidelines by [Few, 2004] several design flaws could be found in the table:
| |
|
| |
| *General Table Design
| |
| :At the first glance the table as a whole does not make any sense. Only after investing some time in trying to understand for what the different rows and columns stand one may get an idea what the table is about.
| |
| :The Table borders are not necessary since they provide no additional information. [Few, 2004]
| |
| :Since there is no table labeling at all, the whole statistics is hard to understand.
| |
| :The Dimensions of the table columns are not properly assigned. While the last column is far too wide, others are too short.
| |
|
| |
| *Table Row Design
| |
| :The Table rows contain different types of information, e.g. "Sold", "On the market" and "Change". This makes it quite hard to read the table and compare table data row-wise.
| |
|
| |
| *Unit Labeling
| |
| :The Units (% and $) within the table cells are badly formatted. Those should be extracted and written into the table header. [Few, 2004]
| |
| :Some units are explicitly displayed (% and $), others not even defined (last column).
| |
| :The placement of some Units (e.g. %) is not consistent. In some columns those are placed <above>, <next to> or <below> the given data.
| |
|
| |
| *Header Definition
| |
| :The header information of the first column is also used in table cells. This is redundant. [Few, 2004]
| |
|
| |
| *Number Design
| |
| :All numbers seem to be aligned left, hence they are hardly comparable and readable. [Few, 2004]
| |
| :The serparator of numbers in table column "units" is missing. This makes the data harder to read or compare.
| |
| :The separator itself is not consistent through the whole statistics (e.g. "Change 2007 to 2008" and "Sold 1/1/08 - 3/31/08").
| |
| :The precision of numbers is not constistent as well. At some Points numbers are rounded to 1 digit (e.g. "Change 2007 to 2008") at other to 3 digits (e.g. "Sold 1/1/08 - 3/31/08").
| |
|
| |
| *Missing Data
| |
| :While all other comparisons between 2007 and 2008 show percentages, none are displayed for the Change from March 2007 to March 2008. These percentages could be easily calculated.
| |
|
| |
| *Table Cell Naming
| |
| :The naming of table cells in some parts is very confusing. The row "Change 2007-2008", for example, describes at one point the change from March 2007 to March 2008 and at another the change from quarter#1 2007 to quarter#1 2008.
| |
|
| |
| == Optimized Table ==
| |
|
| |
| [[Image:RealEstateStatistics.jpg]]
| |
|
| |
| === Improvements ===
| |
|
| |
| *The (sub-)divisions were rearranged in order to give a better overview of the data. Major divisions are now "On the market" and "Sold". Those are grouped into subdivisions which represent different timeslots (e.g. March, April 10th). Because the different parts of the optimized table are better seperated, the viewer no longer has to scan all rows and columns of the table to find the data he looks for.
| |
|
| |
| *Percentages are no longer in a seperate column, but added to the data cell of 2008. That way one can easily compare the values wihtout 'sacrificing' a whole row for data which is not used throughout the whole table.
| |
|
| |
| *Swapping the columns and rows gives consitency of the different units. Those are no longer mixed up (e.g. no % and $ in a column)
| |
|
| |
| *In order make it more easy for the viewer to scan the table for specific data, alternate row fill colors where applied (light-grey and white).
| |
|
| |
| *The dollar unit definition "$" has been extracted from the cells into a the table row definition.
| |
|
| |
| *The annual sums for 2007, 2006 and 2005 are now seperated from the other data since they dont really fit into the scheme of comparing data from 2007 and 2008.
| |
|
| |
| *Number seperators are now consistent. A semicolon marks decimal values and a point marks steps of thousands.
| |
|
| |
| *Since the main target of the table is to illustrate the changes from 2007 to 2008 we color rearranged the cells, so that now data of the same type from 2007 and 2008 are adjacent horizontally. Now they can easily be compared.
| |
|
| |
| == References ==
| |
| [Few, 2004] Stephen Few, Show Me the Numbers: Designing Tables and Graphs to Enlighten, Analytics Press, 2004, Chapter 8 - Table Design.<br>
| |
|
| |
| == Links ==
| |
|
| |
| * [[Teaching:TUW_-_UE_InfoVis_WS_2008/09|InfoVis:Wiki UE Homepage]]
| |
|
| |
| * [http://ieg.ifs.tuwien.ac.at/~gschwand/teaching/infovis_ue_ws08/ UE InfoVis]
| |
|
| |
| *[[Teaching:TUW - UE InfoVis WS 2008/09 - Gruppe 09|Gruppe 09]]
| |