In the past two weeks I've been consulting for two companies: a well-known fitness equipments manufacturer, and another well-known player in the steel industry. We talked about a number of things :-), but in both cases, at some point we had to find the appropriate way to display some technical information to largely non-technical users. Of course, it's all too easy to show very precise data in some kind of chart. However, making those data really
useful for the non-technical user requires so much more than that. In both cases, I believe we ended up with a remarkable result. I applied a little creativity, backed up by some knowledge. The ultimate authority in this field is, according to many, Edward R. Tufte, with his trilogy:
- The Visual Display of Quantitative Information
- Visual Explanations: Images and Quantities, Evidence and Narrative
- Envisioning Information
So far, I've only read his first book; guess I'll go ahead and buy the other two next week.
