my d3 process

background

i've been pixel flipping and bit shifting for a while.
most recently came from scientific visualization
learned d3 while at visual.ly building tools to enable designers
currently building tools and visualizing data at lever.co
and hacking on tributary.io

d3 is about mapping between spaces

space
color
time
animation
interaction
simulation

d3 can help the data visualization process end to end

turn data into JSON, serve it up restfuly
transform data into what d3 layouts expect
e.g. stack layout
tree layouts

d3 is the best way to turn numbers into something visual

get an overview
look for outliers
explore subsets of your data
case studies:
love + death
temperatures

count & aggregate with filters

crossfilter.js
easy to interactively get to individual records counted in an aggregate
e.g. with d3

<3 github

gists power tributary, made it much easier to share code snippets and collaborate
i would love to see "virality" of gists visualized
forking rules prevent pure git visualizations of a gists network/history (can't fork own gist)

reference

tributary.io
d3 api
d3 examples
a fun difficult intro to d3
mixtapes: dot enter + dot append
mike's blog
mike's blocks
clickme (R -> d3)