Workshops
There will be one workshop and two tutorials at Diagrams 2016. Our workshop is:
Furthermore, we have two tutorials detailed below:
- Programming Your Pictures, and
- Visualizing "Information".
Programming Your Pictures: Using GNU R and the Haskell diagrams framework for declarative drawing
Aidan Delaney and Brent Yorgey
- Slides and exercises for this workshop are available here.
Brent Yorgey (http://ozark.hendrix.edu/~yorgey/) is an assistant professor of computer science at Hendrix College in Conway, Arkansas, and a well-known developer and educator in the open-source functional programming community. He has served on the Haskell core libraries committe, on the program committee of the ACM SIGPLAN Haskell Symposium, and currently serves on the steering committee for the Workshop on Functional Art, Music, Modeling, and Design (FARM). His educational materials are widely recommended and used by beginners learning the Haskell programming language. He has led development of the Haskell diagrams framework since its inception in 2008.
Description
The tutorial will be a hands-on introduction to GNU R and the Haskell diagrams framework (http://projects.haskell.org/diagrams) and, incidentally, to the Haskell programming language itself (http://haskell.org). No previous experience with R, Haskell or with functional programming will be assumed. As an embedded domain-specific language, the framework can be used in basic, productive ways without knowing much Haskell; learning Haskell enables more sophisticated uses. The format will consist of presentations of concepts and examples interspersed with hands-on exercises for participants. All necessary software is free and open-source, and detailed installation instructions will be provided.
The tutorial should be of interest to a wide cross-section of Diagrams attendees. The Haskell diagrams framework is a powerful, open-ended, open-source exploratory tool that can be used for a variety of purposes, and may be directly applicable in many contexts that participants care about, both in academic and practical settings, enabling them to explore or produce diagrams in more effective ways.
Abstract
The Haskell diagrams framework (http://projects.haskell.org/diagrams) is an open-source, domain-specific language for creating vector graphics, embedded in the Haskell programming language (http://haskell.org).
The work of dozens of contributors, it serves as a powerful platform for creating illustrations, visualizations, and artwork, as well as a testbed for new ideas in functional domain-specific languages and in functional approaches to graphics. The language is declarative, that is, one writes a program describing what the desired result is rather than explicitly describing the steps needed to draw it. It allows one to work at a high level and to build further abstractions for concisely expressing arbitrary classes of diagrams. The framework can thus be used for rapid prototyping and development of visualizations, and can easily serve as a base upon which to develop more specialized diagram generation software.
The tutorial will be a hands-on introduction to the Haskell diagrams framework and, incidentally, to the Haskell programming language itself. No previous experience with Haskell or with functional programming will be assumed. As an embedded domain-specific language, the framework can be used in basic, productive ways without knowing much Haskell; learning Haskell enables more sophisticated uses. The format will consist of presentations of concepts and examples interspersed with hands-on exercises for participants. All necessary software is free and open-source, and detailed installation instructions will also be provided.
Learning Objectives
At the end of the tutorial, participants will be familiar with the rudiments of the Haskell programming language, and will be able to use the Haskell diagrams framework to create their own moderately sophisticated vector graphics. In addition, participants will be pointed in the direction of next steps to deepen their knowledge, for example, if they wish to develop their own specialized frameworks using the given one as a basis.
Prerequisites
No background in Haskell or functional programming will be assumed. Some experience programming in other languages may be helpful, but is not required. Participants should bring their own laptop for use in completing the exercises. Instructions on installing the required software will be available from http://projects.haskell.org/diagrams before the conference.
Visualizing "Information"
Jenna Hartel, Rebecca Noone and Eden Rusnell
Dr. Jenna Hartel is an Associate Professor at the Faculty of Information, University of Toronto. Since the beginning of her academic career she has believed that visual methods are powerful tools for research and she has taken steps to introduce them into the field of information science. Dr. Hartel has won the Association for Library and Information Science methodology award for a paper on photographic methods; published the first methodological paper on visual methods in Journal of the Association for
Information Science and Technology (Hartel & Thomson, 2011); hosted and presented on many panels about visual methods at international conferences; and taught classes on visual methods at the Facultyof Information, University of Toronto. Dr. Hartel is the creator of iSquare Research Program and leader of the iSquare Research Team. She has spear-headed the collection of more than 1,500 drawings of information from twelve countries and numerous academic disciplines.
Abstract
This tutorial introduces the Diagrams community to arts-informed visual research, using the draw-and- write technique as an example [1]. It does so in the context of the iSquare Research Program (www.iSquares.info), an ongoing effort to understand and document “information” as a visual phenomenon. The 90-minute session will begin with a demonstration and description of the draw-and-write technique as it is employed in the iSquare project. Then, a sample of drawings of information will be displayed and analytical attention will be placed upon link diagrams, grouping diagrams, and pictorial metaphors for information. The audience will be engaged in a game that will help them understand the distinctions between these major forms of graphic representations. Next, the iSquareteam’s artist-in-residence will locate the iSquares in a genealogy of contemporary art’s themes and practices and demonstrate how the images can be used in art exhibitions and interactive story-telling.To conclude, the pedagogical applications of the draw-and-write technique and the iSquare protocol will be discussed from the point-of-view of an instructor and graduate student. The event includes several hands-on activities, interdisciplinary perspectives from three fields (information science, visual studies, and education) and a collaborative spirit. Participants will be encouraged to apply arts-informed visual methods and the draw-and-write technique to their own research questions, and they will leave the tutorial with a fresh sense of information as a visual phenomenon that can be better understood through diagrams. An interactive art exhibition of a portion of the iSquare corpus can also accompany the tutorial and remain on display for the duration of the Diagrams conference.
The iSquared Research Programme
The draw-and-write technique is an empirical method for gathering visual data. Research subjects are
prompted to perform a drawing activity along with a writing exercise, interview, or focus group. The
approach is increasing in popularity across the social sciences because it is relatively easy and
inexpensive to implement and it generates an evocative visual data set.The iSquare Research Program, started in 2011, is based at the Faculty of Information, University of
Toronto and employs the draw-and-write technique. Research subjects are asked to respond to the
question, “What is information?” by drawing upon a 4” by 4” piece of paper, called in “information
square” (or “iSquare” for short). The ongoing research program explores three questions: 1.) How do
people visualize the concept of information?; 2.) How do visual conceptions of information differ
among populations? and 3.) How do these images relate to the traditional conceptions of information
made of words?
In the past four years more than 1,500 iSquares have been collected from around the world and across
several disciplines. The fresh insights into the nature of information that the iSquare Research Program
has produced have been reported in journals of information science The drawings have been
showcased as exhibitions at international conferences and are displayed on the iSquare website.
The iSquare protocol has also been employed as a classroom activity to introduce Masters-level
students to visual research and to engage with theoretical issues that surround information.