News and updates
Sept 3, 2014: Welcome to IAT 814.
General Information
This course will provide an introduction to the fields of information visualization and visual analytics: the science of analytical reasoning supported by highly interactive visual interfaces. We will study techniques and algorithms for creating effective visualizations based on principles from graphic design, visual art, perceptual psychology, and cognitive science. Topics include perception, visualization design, and analytical techniques of working with data. The analytical work that people do includes such information seeking tasks as browsing, search, comparison, selection, and the formulation of hypotheses on the basis of observing collections of data.
The goal of this class is to provide students with a basic grounding in techniques that can be used to design and complex information workspaces, as well as an introduction to theories that help inform the design of such systems.
Regular announcements will be made on the course Canvas site.
Texts
There is one required text for the class:
- Visual Thinking for Design by Colin Ware, Morgan Kaufman, 2008. This is available as an ebook from the SFU LIbrary. You can also buy it from Chapters/Indigo or Amazon Books. Other interesting books and websites can be found on the Resources page.
- I am also using a new book , Visualization Analysis and Design by Tamara Munzner, Taylor & Francis, 2014. Because we are using a pre-publication version, the instructions to access a password-protected copy are on the course Canvas site. Please respect the fact that the author has kindly made this available and DO NOT share it.
Other resources will be posted on the Resources page as needed.
We will also use the Tableau™ visualization package. You can download it from the Tableau website for installation on your personal PC or Mac: instructions are on the Resources page. Tableau's data visualization software is provided through the Tableau for Teaching program.
Disclaimer
The professor reserves the right to modify any of these plans as needed during the course of the class.