DYNAMIC INTERACTIVE GRAPHICS PEDRO VALERO MORA UNIVERSITAT DE VALÈNCIA I HAVE WORN MANY HATS • Degree in Psycology • Phd on Human Computer Interaction (HCI): Formal Methods for Evaluation of Interfaces • Teaching Statistics in the Department of Psychology since1990, Full Professor (Catedrático) in 2012 • Research interest in Statistical Graphics, Computational Statistics • Comercial Packages (1995-) Statview, DataDesk, JMP, Systat, SPSS (of course) • Non Comercial 1998- Programming in Lisp-Stat, contributor to ViSta (free statistical package) • Book on Interactive Dynamic Graphics 2006 (with Forrest Young and Michael Friendly). Wiley • Editor of two special issues of the Journal of Statistical Software (User interfaces for R and the Health of Lisp-Stat) • Papers, conferences, seminars, etc. DYNAMIC-INTERACTIVE GRAPHICS • Working on this topic since mid 90s • Other similar topics are visualization, computer graphics, etc. • They are converging in the last few years • I see three periods in DIG • Special hardware • Desktop computers • The internet...and beyond • This presentation will make a review of the History of DIG and will draw lessons from its evolution 1. THE SPECIAL HARDWARE PERIOD • Tukey's Prim 9 • Tukey was not the only one, in 1988 a book summarized the experiences of many researchers on this topic • Lesson#1: Hire a genius and give him unlimited resources, it always works • Or not... • Great ideas but for limited audience, not only because the cost but also the complexity… 2. DESKTOP COMPUTERS • About 1990, the audience augments...macintosh users • Many things only possible previously for people with deep pockets were now possible for…the price of a Mac • Not cheap but affordable • Several packages with a graphical user interface: • Commercial: Statview, DataDesk, SuperANOVA (yes super), JMP, Systat… • Non Commercial: Lisp-Stat, ViSta, XGobi, MANET... 2.1. COMMERCIAL: DATADESK • Excellent for Exploratory Data Analysis, founded by P. F. Velleman (student of Tukey) in 1985 (still kicking) • Linking, selecting, filtering, corkboards, models, fast, • Teaching • An interesting niche was teaching, companion of great textbooks on introductory statistics • However, many people use the textbook with SPSS or other statistical packages. • Lesson #2: Statistical analysis must be taught with the same package that will be used for real analysis • It did not succeed although it is still in the market, but not that many people use or speaks about it. • A mystery to me…reasons? • Audience? Lesson #3: Think in your audience • Presentation graphics? Static graphics? Lesson #4: Once the fun is over you need to freeze the picture 2.2.1 NON-COMMERCIAL: VISTA • Started about 1990 by F. W. Young • Linking, selecting filtering, spreadplots (like corkboards or dashboards) , statistics, fast...the same as DataDesk but less polished • Excellent for Exploratory Data Analysis • Based on XLisp-Stat 2.2.2. NON-COMMERCIAL: LISPSTAT • Programming language for statistics based on Lisp with elements of S. • Developed by Luke Tierney, he works currently in R • Designed specifically for Dynamic Interactive Graphics • Lisp-Stat was like R/S but with interactive graphics and user interface elements (buttons, lists, mouse events, windows...all native not TCL/TK or Java or Python or else) • Lisp is great!… according to Ross Ihaka the creator of R • It was abandoned almost by everybody about 2003 • What did it happen?: In a single letter -> R • Why? • Static graphics #Lesson 5: Static graphics (did not I say this before?) • Familiarity? #Lesson 6: Make great software part of student’s education • Community? #Lesson 7: You need a community of users and developers 3. THE INTERNET • The impact of the internet has occurred at many levels • Colaboration, distribution, spread, has made non-commercial collaborative products very common • Sometimes is a problem more than a solution: many programs producing solutions for the same problem, projects discontinued, partially developed, etc. • Delivering products in the browser so everybody can play with them easily • I do not know much about the commercial products currently in the market (but I would love to know more…any free licenses there?) • On the non-commercial (libre?), R is the king 3.1 R • It is great! However, there is an area that could be improved • Graphical User Interfaces! (Come on, it is 2016!) • I am talking of something that my colleagues and students in Psychology could use (just copy Statview!) • No, R-Commander is not sufficiently easy • TBH, there are some exciting packages that go in the right direction (Shiny): • However: A good GUI is not only that! • Lesson #8: Hire specialists in human factors if you wish a really good GUI • I am pessimistic about getting this right non-commercially, there are things that do not pay off academically DISCUSSION • Evolution: DIG progressively closer to the masses • Supporting the idea of data as a public good that anybody can use for understanding the world we live, take decisions, evaluate policies, etc. • Current barriers steeper on the human factor than on the technical factor • Testing: What do the people do? What do they understand? • Education: What do the people know? How can people be taught for understanding statistics? • Communication: Can the message still be manipulated? • Cognition: Are human beings able to think statistically? THANKS FOR YOUR ATTENTION.