Web 3D Data Visualization of Spatio Temporal Data using Data Driven Document (D3js)

Abstract

Data visualization is an important tool to analyze complex Spatio Temporal data. The web based data visualization tools are mostly 2D. A versatile tool would be one which will combine 2D and 3D data visualization techniques, as this would give an extra dimension, analytical usability and also be very easy to implement with a simple API. The current technologies for such visualization are based on SVG, OpenGL, WebGL and other proprietary 3D libraries. These are useful but are difficult and cumbersome to use and the focus shifts from the data in question to be studied to methods and hacks of how the above listed tools can be manipulated to visualize the specific result patterns from the data. This paper provides a direction of how to use a web based JavaScript library, which encompasses some of the technologies used above and provides an abstract interface to be able to use this effectively to visualize large complex sets of spatio temporal data. This will render a more intuitive, user focused, tactile navigation and selection for specific analysis of large set of Spatio-Temporal data is illustrated in the chloropleth example using D3.js on a spatio temporal database of the Edison electric company data of users and usage for New York City and its suburbs.