 "The Full Repertoire of Existing Charts" | 2008-01-24 |
| - Reviewed By ericmethot |
| This book is a gem. It's really a dictionary of just about all of the types of charts that exist with the exception of interactive ones of course (we'll excuse the author though). If you have a problem and you think that some form of chart could help you then this book should contain the answer. Note that this isn't a book that you'd read from cover to cover though. |
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| "Keep this reference by your side to help your data tell its story" | 2006-09-10 |
| - Reviewed By toddstark |
I think anyone who solves serious problems by analyzing data will want to own a copy of this book. Being able to organize data into the right visual image can often make no less a difference than that between seeing the answer to the problem vs. getting lost in the complexity and variation in the data.
This is a uniquely comprehensive encyclopedia of graphical techniques with just enough detail on each technique to help you choose the right one for each situation.
There are no long, detailed explanations of principles. What you get are a few illustrations of each type of graph, with a general description of the strengths of that particular technique and several variations to show how it could be applied to different situations which share some central similarity.
One review criticized the alphabetic listing of the techniques, which is a reasonable critique in general. However I think the weakness is mitigated significantly by the way the graphs are grouped together into broad categories once you get to those. The alphabetically listed individual headings are mainly for cross-reference. It seems clear to me that the book wasn't intended to be read from front to back alphabetically, but that the reader would have a rough idea what sort of graph they needed, would start with the heading for that category, and then when neccessary, would refer to the cross-referenced section alphabetically.
In any case, I found it useful to place sticker-tabs on the pages for the main categories of graph that I care most about, and use those tabs as my starting place for choosing the right graphic. There are about ten broad categories of graphs I usually care most about, such as bar, area, column, line, and point graphs, control charts, statistical distribution charts, and time/activity charts. In addition there are about another dozen or so big categories of topics about graphs in general, such as choosing the right aspect ratio, the right font, and the right scale.
Don't get the wrong idea here, none of these topics is covered in great detail, this book is wonderful *index* to visual techniques for showing data for operational purposes but it is not a detailed how-to or an academic treatise on the individual techniques. Also, the book is not intended for creating flashy presentation or marketing graphics, nor does it cover argument maps, truth maps, or any other single sort of conceptual maps in any great detail (although it does touch on the topic in general).
A welcome bonus is that the bibliography is particularly well selected, and not just a list of popular books on graphs. Some of his references are difficult to get and I suspect that some of these sources may even out of print, but some of them like Tukey's work and William Cleveland's texts are well worth searching for.
This is an indispensible encyclopedia of operational information graphics for helping you to help data tell its own story in its clearest and most revealing light, whether you are trying to manage the quality of a process or track down the source of a problem. The examples are extremely well chosen and representative, and the explanations are concise and helpful in a way that lets you use this as a quick reference and not just as a textbook.
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| "excellent reference guide for graphs/charts" | 2005-10-14 |
| - Reviewed By fireislandmuffin |
| this is an excellent book if you are working with different types of graphs or charts. we use it as the bible while programming gui tools to create graphs. if you are looking to make meaningful graphs, this book can clue you in to the different types of graphs that will best illustrate your data. |
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 "A great source for graphical ideas." | 2004-11-17 |
| - Reviewed By User: A1OXUG89ISJE7B |
This book is 400+ pages, and I would estimate it contains
5-10 graphics examples per page. If you've got "writer's block"
and can't think of a new way to graphically present your data,
then this is the book for you. Just thumb through it until
something catches your eye, and then read the details about
that kind of graph. Maybe not 100% 'comprehensive' as the
title implies ... but pretty darn close! ;)
For people like me who have to do a lot of different kinds
of graphs, this book is a great resource to have on your shelf.
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 "Alphabetical arrangement not very useful" | 2004-10-15 |
| - Reviewed By arni_magnusson |
Three stars is perhaps harsh, but this book would be much more useful if it had been structured differently. Open this book
and on the first page the entries start rolling: "Abscissa", "Abscissa axis", "Abstract graph", etc. Most readers will be
exhausted before reaching the letters D or E...
Having compiled this exhaustive list of information graphics, one would expect the author to provide some kind of an
overview, guidelines, or some useful grouping of the different types of graphics. The closest thing to such insights is
found in the brief preface (pp. 4-5) and the "Graph" entry (pp. 164-177).
I have to disagree with the reviewers describing this book as helpful "to select the best graphic or chart to convey
information in the most efficient way". When you "turn to this book and and pick the most appropriate graphic type", which
alphabetical entries are you going to look up? And which entries are you going to miss?
This book does serve a purpose as a catalogue and a 4 page bibliography, but the best books for learning how to create
informative and efficient graphics are those written by Edward Tufte and William Cleveland. |
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| "Encyclopedic Work About Data Presentation" | 2004-07-27 |
| - Reviewed By rmlane1 |
| This is not a how-to-book. Harris has written a definitive book about data presentation. Topics are organized alphabetically and cross-referenced. Almost every entry is accompanied by illustrations and sometime many of them. I have other books that describe data presentation but they are incomplete compared with Harris's book. I have not seen such an array of presentation illustrations in one place before. Some of the illustrations show plots that I frequently use with interesting additions; for example, the diagonal in pairwise scatter plots typically names variables, Harris has an illustration with histograms for each variable on the diagonal. What a great idea! Almost everyone knows how to construct pie charts. Harris's discussion of pie charts is six pages long. After a brief introduction, he gives a description and terminology, general characteristics, methods to incorporate descriptive and quantitative information, reference angles, showing changes over time, varying the size of circles proportional to the overall value of the data, highlighting slices of the pie, improving legibility, grouping sections of the chart, using pie charts instead of histograms, encodeing additional quantitative data, adding depth, overlapping pie charts, decographs, belt charts, and cirlce graphs. Who could have imagined that lowly pie charts were so versatile and communicative? Some have dogmatically asserted, "Pie charts are a very bad way of displaying information." Although I generally agree, Harris has given me much to think about and I will not be so averse to using them in the future. |
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