Telling stories about data. A dynamic and interactive approach to disseminate thematic indicators

Transcription

1 EUROSTAT New Techniques and Technologies for Statistics Brussels February 2011 Telling stories about data. A dynamic and interactive approach to disseminate thematic indicators Mara Cammarrota, Stefano De Francisci, Valeria de Martino, Alessandra Ferrara, Michele Ferrara, Antonio Pitrone, Stefania Rossetti ISTAT - Italian National Institute of Statistics Division of Users Needs, Integration and Territory

2 Outline - The Idea - An overview of Noi Italia indicators to understand Italy - What s behind 2

3 The Idea - Giving users an overview of Italian and European socio-economic indicators to understand the most important positive and negative aspects of the country in which they live. - Comparing the national position with that of other European countries and highlighting regional differences in the Italian national context. - Complying with the below statement of the Code of Practice for European statistics: European Statistics should be presented in a clear and understandable form, disseminated in a suitable and convenient manner, available and accessible on an impartial basis with supporting metadata and guidance 3

4 The Idea The indicators have been selected: - in view of the main targets defined in Lisbon strategy, to understand where and how Italy and all the others European country are positioned about it; - considering the Community Support Framework (CSF), in order to analyse a development pathway and to reduce social hardship for the Italian south regions; - allowing comparison at European and Nuts2 level. Due to lack of indicator database, they have been calculated starting from basic data, coming from different sources. 4

5 An overview The Home Page 120 indicators are proposed, arranged 19 thematic sectors ranging from economic, social, demographic and environmental fields 5

6 An overview The second level Indicators per Sector Spotlights on the Indicators Highlights on Sector 6

7 An overview The Indicator level Thematic topic at a glance Download area - graphs for all EU countries; - tables with the last years data for Italian regions (NutsUTS2); - map for Italian regions related to the most recent data; - time series for the indicator. Comparison of EU countries Dynamic graph Metadata area - definition of indicator and measurements unit. Storytelling Sources, Publications and Web links area Embedding code Choropleth map Comparison of the Italian regions (Nuts2) Dynamic graph Dynamic Bar chart 7 Storytelling Time Series animation Embedding code

8 8 Noi Italia indicators to understand Italy Thematic topic at a glance

9 Download area Users can download: - time graphs series andtables indicators tables for Nuts2 related level to European comparison the Nuts2 level. comparison; within the Italian territory, together with a map related to the last available data. 9

10 Metadata area Metadata provided explain: - some the institutions description mainly reference hyperlinks publications that survey ofcollect how thatdata enable those users statistics to better were analyse calculated, further what aspects theyrelated mean, to the theindicators reference legislation and the unit of measurement 10

11 11 Noi Italia indicators to understand Italy Comparison of EU countries Dynamic Bar chart

12 Comparison of the Italian regions (Nuts2) Dynamic Bar chart & Storytelling 12

13 Comparison of the Italian regions (Nuts2) Choropleth map & Storytelling 13

14 Comparison of the Italian regions (Nuts2) Time Series animation 14

15 Noi Italia indicators to understand Italy Comparison of the Italian regions (Nuts2) Time Series animation 15

16 16 Noi Italia indicators to understand Italy Embedding code

17 The technological solution for the dynamic graph In order to obtein the result achieved we used a powerful and innovative data visualisation component (vislet explorer), that use widget technologies and is based on a GeoAnalytics Visualization tool, Statistics explorer (1) Statistics explorer is a web compliant application which enables users: - To explore simultaneously spatial, temporal and multivariate data - To discover interesting relationships - To share their incremental discoveries with other people (1) developed by NComVA AB (Norrköping Communicative Visual Analytics) a spinoff company from the Norrköping Visualization Centre at Linkoping University 17

18 The technological solution for the dynamic graph Statistic explorer uses Adobe s Flash basic graphics and Flex. In details, it uses NComVA s own GAV Flash framework programmed in Adobe s object-oriented (OO) language (ActionScript), and it uses Adobe Flash API for graphics, integrated with the Adobe Flex Framework for the user interfaces. 18

19 The production process for the dynamic graph To produce the dynamic object (vislet) we went through three main steps: -Production of dataset; -Production of the xml files; -Integration of dynamic object (vislet) in a distribuited Web environment. 19

20 Production of dataset Goal to achieve: -To collect data from several sources in different file format and integrate them with the given Statistics explorer data structure. Decision taken: -To distribuite the workload to collect the data between all the Istat data production departments; -use a well known common tool that could easily automatize the needed transformation of data. Excel file format was the chosen environment, some VBA macros have been implemented 20

21 Production of the xml files Goal to achieve: -to produce, in a short time, the.xml file containing both the dataset, that the graph represents, and the story, that explains the graph. Decision taken: -to standardize and automate the process production, implementing an application offering a very user-friendly front end to produce the.xml file and set easily the parameter for the two main graphic components used (Map and Histogram) 21

22 Integration of vislet in a distribuited Web environment Goal to achieve: -to integrate dynamically the Content Management System (Typo3) with the vislet system to avoid hard coding the parameter to embed the dynamic objects (vislet) in more than 200 pages Decision taken: -to implement a web service remotely queried by Typo3 and it answers back providing the html code necessary to embed the appropriate vislet for each page and for different datasets. 22

23 23 Noi Italia indicators to understand Italy Web infrastructure scheme

24 Web infrastructure scheme THANKS FOR YOUR ATTENTION Antonio Pitrone 24