Category: Books

Data Visualisation with d3.js Cookbook

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datavisbookbought this great book on  d3.js (Data-Driven documents), written by  Nick Qi Zhu

D3 can plot map in various projections, however do not expect to get same set of (overlapping) functionality as Leaflet or OpenLayers. D3 can extend these mapping frameworks. For OL3 simple  example is here for Leaflet, my favourite is  hexbins or check my own experiment here.

While D3 is kind of ‘base’ charting library (lot of utility functions, helpers) , there is upper , high level library too  that can provide lot of ‘boilerplate’ for common charts. Here comes great news:

Nick Qi Zhu   is also author of the open source javascript  lib dc.js   (Dimensional Charting) library  that is using crossfilter (Fast Multidimensional Filtering for Coordinated Views) . Part of the dc.js lib is set of most common charts and one of them is choropleth map .

Other resources:

D3 Animation : http://blog.visual.ly/creating-animations-and-transitions-with-d3-js/

Design selections: http://www.awwwards.com/fresh-ui-inspiration-in-the-era-of-google-material-and-design-patterns.html

Why you should visit cemeteries

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I really like this post from Avdi Grimm called “The Passion Gospel“. This remembers me a first chapter in a book: “The Art Of Thinking Clearly” from Rolf Dobelli:

..”no journalist is interested in failures – with exception of fallen superstars.This makes the cemetery invisible to outsiders. In daily life, because triumph is made more visible than failure, you systematically overestimate your chances of succeeding.”

..”The media is not interested in digging around in the graveyards of the unsuccessful. Nor is this its job.”

I think same  bias applies to blogs, twitters, facebook and press releases of companies or marketing in general. And to this blog too :)

…you should recognize that survivorship bias is at work, distorting the probability of success like cut glass..

..Survivorship bias means this: people systematically overestimate their chances of success. Guard against it by frequently visiting the graves of once-promising projects, investments and careers. It is a sad walk, but one that should clear your mind.”

 

 

Programming iOS6 by Matt Neuburg

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Programming iOS6I am using this fat book (mine is  iOS5 version ) as my best reference for understanding all behind the iOS concept programming. What makes me really happy is that Matt provides in-deep look into every important aspect of iOS programming in a style that is not just ‘tutorial for monkeys’ but rather ‘full understanding’ .  His book preview can be also found here : http://www.apeth.com/iOSBook/ in fact this was my original source of the book existence that lead me to purchase it in paper form. Thanks for the online version too !

samples are here: https://github.com/mattneub/Programming-iOS-Book-Examples

 

I hope there will be iOS7 version too.