Data Visualization

Data Visualization

Facilitated by Amanda Hickman - github.com/amandabee

Syllabus, Cheat Sheets, etc. amandabee.github.io/CUNY-data-skills

1. 1. 1. 1. Reasons to want data

• Focus on a population
• Evidence for a claim you're making is actually true
• Reduce harm

1. 1. 1. 1. When we're talking about data, we're talking about something in a spreadsheet that you can chop up and analyze and such

• A PDF is not data yet, because it's basically a picture.
  • Tabula from Nerd Powerful is a great tool for pulling data from PDF tables
• Charts and maps are not data because you can't really reverse engineer them

1. 1. 1. 1. Where to find it

• Librarians. They live for this
• Open data portals
  • Open data is a set of laws that governments are required to put out public data
• Ask for sources on reports and charts that you see
  • If you see a great visualization, then you should call up the authors to try and get their data
• Academics
  • PhD's have great data that will never be seen because they're academics and thus write unintelligibly
• SF Indicators Project
• Census
• American Community Survey
• CensusReporter.org
• Bureau of Labor Statistics
• Community Expenditure Survey
• Various public health departments
• Think tanks
• Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) / Freedom of Information Law (FOIL)
  • Muck Rock will help you out on doing a FOIA request.
    • Check out examples of letters they've sent, and their boiler plate letters
    • They'll alert you about timeline stuff
  • There may be costs involved
  • This is kinda your last resort
  • When making a request, ask for the person who's responsible, not just a receptionist. You need someone to hold accountable
• Geo Commons
  • Very open set of geographical data sets
  • Great for polygons like districts
• Planning Departments
• Cicero
  • Legislation
• Sunlight Foundation

1. 1. 1. 1. Strategies for getting data and analyzing

• If someone tells you they don't have the data, that's not the end. They can help you find it.
• Ask for the name of their database
• Ask for the specs of the database they're using
• Get a lawyer if they claim that giving you data is a threat to homeland security
• Ask for possible costs up front
• Ask StackExchange
• NICAR

1. 1. 1. 1. Working with Data

• Provenance matters
  • Especially if you're using open data from places like Geo Commons. You need to understand where the data came from
• Not everything should be data

1. 1. 1. 1. Tools

• Hard
  • R + RStudio
  • QGIS
• Medium
  • Carto DB
  • High Charts
  • Mapbox
  • D3
• Easy
  • Chart Builder
• Geo Coders
  • Texas A&M has a good tool
  • Check her site