Do users see what your systems say? Do people understand the meaning when they get raw data? If your systems aren�t translating trends, facts, and figures into the minds of decision makers, you could short circuit the future.
In a business world where decisions must take place in nanoseconds — you need to make sure your systems deliver both the information and the meaning quickly. For many companies, systems have evolved to quickly ferret out, dig up and transfer data. You can slice it, dice it, and sort it different ways as quickly as you can blink. It's a great first step. But, if data isn�t put into a picture, its meaning may never get inside the heads of people.
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Call us a visual society, but
"If you've ever tried to produce data-driven graphics, you know the limitations."
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people want to see the picture. A table full of numbers might tell the story — but many people can�t decipher it. Trying to pick out trends from looking at rows and rows of numbers isn�t always easy. Conversely, a chart or graph that draws the picture will often tell the story without a word of explanation necessary.
Data visualization techniques and technologies are starting to put pictures into place. And these capabilities can add eye-popping power when they create charts from dynamic or real time information over the Web.
Consider Corda's PopChart service that brings new levels of interactivity to Internet information. Imagine delivering a system that puts summary level information into a chart and lets people click on chart segments to drill down. End users can dive into the details, instantly create other graphs, or view news stories or abstracts that pertain to the segment. (Check out some live examples.)
Better yet, this type of interaction can come from dynamic data that gets summarized on the fly. And it all happens in nanoseconds.
If you've ever tried to produce data-driven graphics, you know the limitations. First, it's hard enough to quickly create the graph out of certain sets of data, then it can be difficult to transmit a bandwidth gobbling large graphic file. And, if your intranet or Web site is already busy, you probably shudder to think of the response time problems that graphics can create.
Using conventional techniques, you could swamp your server as it tries to do the math to create the graphic and then pump out the big file. Most IT managers will be taken back to text before they every get serious about graphics and charting.
Corda's tools cleverly distribute the way charts and graphs are processed and then shrink the results to something small that won't choke your routers. Your Web database or application can pass off the data to one of Corda�s graphics engines, so it can do the hard work and create the graphic.
"Corda's tools cleverly distribute the way charts and graphs are processed and then shrink the results to something small that won't choke your routers."
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It then sends back the picture to the user.
PopChart supports all kinds of graphics formats so it can create Flash, GIF, PNG, and SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics). It's Java based so it supports all common platforms of web servers. This platform independent approach keeps your options open to work with any web server or pass data to any type of client, including a PDA.
PopChart is one of the first applications that can write to Macromedia's Flash environment. This feature steps up the speed because vector rather than bitmapped images are sent.
For busy web environments, Corda's distributed processing approach looks pretty slick. I think its architecture will make it much more scalable than pushing all the work to a single server.
So next time somebody asks for better tools for decision making, don't fear that you will blow down your servers trying to create a graphic. Check out your tool set, you might be able to paint a picture easier than you think.
