Talk:Interactive visualization

Propose merging this article with Visualization (graphic)

I would argue that visualization is by definition interactive. It goes without saying that people use mice, keyboards, etc. to interact with visual data on computers in real time. I suppose it doesn't hurt to explicitly say so, but I don't think it's worth a separate article. I propose merging this with Visualization (graphic).

Brad Halls 20:39, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

I agree. Or at the very least we could rename the article to "Interactivity in visualization" so that it doesn't get confused with the other visualization subject articles. Please comment here if you have an opinion on this. --Infografica (talk) 23:54, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

I don't think renaming is a solution here. "Interactive visualization" is a concept on it's own. The term itself has a google rate of 374.000. This article simply needs further improvement. -- Marcel Douwe Dekker (talk) 10:12, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

If "interactive visualization" is a concept on its own, perhaps it makes sense to figure out more precisely what the concept is. It's not just the quality of this article alone that matters, but how it fits into already large set of visualization articles. It's entirely possible that someone interested in data visualization in general--but who is unfamiliar with the field's terminology--might type "interactive visualization" into Wikipedia. I also think Brad's reaction above (that all visualization is interactive) is logical.

That said, I like the idea of using Google to get a sense of current usage. As far as I can see, the main distinct idea in the top results seems to be a set of particular techniques for speeding up scientific visualization to allow interactive frame rates. That corresponds to the material in the "rapid response to human input" section of the current version of the article. Given this, my suggestion is that (if the article is kept) we put the "rapid response" section front and center. I also believe it would be useful to make explicit the focus of the article, and say how it relates to the other articles. How does this sound as a plan? --Infografica (talk) 16:37, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

If we are doing to keep this article on "interactive" visualization (implying that this is somehow fundamentally different than visualization itself), then I think that in order to be consistent, we need to also create the following new articles:

• interactive databases
• interactive spreadsheets
• interactive word processors
• interactive computer games
• interactive CAD programs
• interactive Wiki's
• interactive ... well, you get the idea. :-)

Brad Halls (talk) 01:39, 18 August 2008 (UTC)