How to Choose Chart Types (pic) | Hacker News Reader

How to Choose Chart Types (pic)

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143 pointsnickb12 comments

The source post, including a PDF version: http://extremepresentation.typepad.com/blog/2006/09/choosing...

One failing of this diagram is its reliance on 'what Excel provides', including chart techniques that are difficult to interpret or misleading, such as pie charts and 3D area charts. Please, for the love of quantitative visualization, don't use 3D charts unless you understand the implications.

But they really break up the monotony of the bullets-for-each-thought Powerpoint presentations!

Or should I say:

   * 3D charts
      * good
      * break up monotony of
         * bulleted lists
         * boring presentations
      * unreadable
         * less questions about data
         * less uncomfortable moments

"One failing of this diagram is its reliance on 'what Excel provides'"

I'm not sure that's a failing. The majority of the folks producing charts ad hoc will be faced with that same constraint. This will, hopefully, help them make the best of their meager means.

I'm curious, what's wrong with pie charts?

Primarily for two reasons: difficulty in comparison between charts, and because comparing area is more difficult than comparing length. The Wikipedia article has good background information: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pie_chart

On that matter, I heartily recommend Tufte's "The Visual Display of Quantitative Information": http://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/books_vdqi

Not included is what to do if your data is location based.

http://www.vimeo.com/1998080

http://www.UUorld.com/

In the broader subject of illustrating any thought I rather liked the suggestions of http://www.thebackofthenapkin.com/. The main categories from it:

who/what - portrait how much - chart where - map when - timeline how - flowchart why - multiple variable plot

I like the Information Design site at http://interface.fh-potsdam.de/infodesignpatterns/patterns.p...

Click on the "Patterns" tab and select the categories on the left.

patternbrowser.org is a bit too busy for my taste, too hard to structure my thinking about how to best chart information.

Also, a Periodic Table of Visualisation: http://www.visual-literacy.org/periodic_table/periodic_table...

My recommendation here is: Zelazny, Gene - Say it with charts.

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