How To Choose ‘Advanced’ Data Visualization Tools by Doug Henschen.
From the post:
How do you separate the “advanced” visualization products from the also rans? In a new report, Forrester analysts Boris Evelson and Noel Yuhanna identify six traits that separate advanced data visualization from static graphs: dynamic data, visual querying, linked multi-dimensional visualization, animation, personalization, and actionable alerts. Dynamic data is the ability to update visualizations as data changes in sources such as databases. With visual querying you can change the query by selecting or clicking on a portion of the graph or chart (to drill down, for example). With multi-dimensional linking, selections made in one chart are reflected as you navigate into other charts. With personalization you can give power users an in-depth view and newbies a simpler view, and you can also control access to data based on user- and role-based access privileges. Visualizations can illuminate important trends and conditions, but what if you don’t see the visualization? Alerting is there as a safeguard, so you can set thresholds and parameters that trigger messages whether you’re interacting with reports or not.
Forrester’s report, “The Forrester Wave: Advanced Data Visualization Platforms, Q3 2012,” is available online from the SAS Web site. (The report was not sponsored upfront by any vendor, but SAS fared well in the research and purchased download rights for the report, as it often does with Gartner Magic Quadrant reports.) So that’s what sets advanced products apart, but how do you pick the product that’s right for your organization. Forrester’s Wave report puts IBM, Information Builders, SAP, SAS, Tableau, Tibco, and Oracle in the advanced data visualization “leaders” wave. That’s a pretty long list if you ask me, but the report includes a scorecard with individual 0 (weak) to 5 (strong) grades detailing more than 16 product attributes. Tableau, IBM, and SAP score highest on “geospatial integration,” for example, whereas SAS, Tableau, and Tibco Spotfire score highest on visualization “animation,” a technique used, for example, to show changes over time, in relationship to pricing changes, or other variables. Vendors in the “strong performers” wave include Microsoft, MicroStrategy, Actuate, QlikTech, SpagoBI, and Panorama Software.
I like Forrester Wave reports because the scoring and the weighting of the scores is spelled out in detail, so you can tweak the scoring formula to your own liking. For example, Forrester weighted 50% of its overall score of its assessment of current products and 50% on “Strategy.” Within strategy, 40% of the score was based on “commitment” and 45% was based on “product direction” whereas only 10% was based on “pricing and licensing” and 5% on “transparency.” Personally, I would make the strategy scores account for about 40% of the overall score, and I would raise the weighting of “pricing and licensing,” as I’m guessing customers will care much more about that than “commitment,” whatever that means.
What’s missing from this evaluation of data visualization tools, advanced or not?
As far as I can tell, Forrester never considers the skill of users with the tools or more importantly, their insight into the data.
If you have ever seen a good presentation using PowerPoint and then remembered all the other “death by PowerPoint” presentations you have suffered through in your career, you know what I am talking about.
A tool is no better or worse than the user attempting to use it.
A strong tool will not compensate for weak users. Buy solutions accordingly.