Visualizing Data is my 2007 book about computational information design. It covers the path from raw data to how we understand it, detailing how to begin with a set of numbers and produce images or software that lets you view and interact with information. When first published, it was the only book(s) for people who wanted to learn how to actually build a data visualization in code.

The text was published by O’Reilly in December 2007 and can be found at Amazon and elsewhere. Amazon also has an edition for the Kindle, for people who aren’t into the dead tree thing. (Proceeds from Amazon links found on this page are used to pay my web hosting bill.)

Examples for the book can be found here.

The book covers ideas found in my Ph.D. dissertation, which is the basis for Chapter 1. The next chapter is an extremely brief introduction to Processing, which is used for the examples. Next is (chapter 3) is a simple mapping project to place data points on a map of the United States. Of course, the idea is not that lots of people want to visualize data for each of 50 states. Instead, it’s a jumping off point for learning how to lay out data spatially.

The chapters that follow cover six more projects, such as salary vs. performance (Chapter 5), zipdecode (Chapter 6), followed by more advanced topics dealing with trees, treemaps, hierarchies, and recursion (Chapter 7), plus graphs and networks (Chapter 8).

This site is used for follow-up code and writing about related topics.

• Visualizing Data Examples
• On needing approval for what we create, and losing control over how it’s distributed
• Brains on the Line
• All Streets
• Watching the evolution of the “Origin of Species”
• The Earth at night
• Piet Mondrian Goes to the Super Bowl
• Sustainable Creativity at Pixar
• Surfing, Orgies, and Apple Pie
• Eric Idle on “Scale”
• New for 2010
• Are electronic medical records really about data?

• Feb 2008 – April 2008
• May 2008 – June 2008
• June 2008 – August 2008
• Sept 2008 – Dec 2008
• Jan 2009 – May 2009
• June 2009 – Nov 2009
• 2010 and 2011