StickyLand: Breaking the Linear Presentation of Computational Notebooks

TL;DR

StickyLand is a notebook extension that allows users to organize code non-linearly with sticky cells, improving accessibility, interactivity, and productivity in computational notebooks.

Contribution

It introduces sticky cells that remain visible, enabling non-linear organization and interactive visual analytics in notebooks, addressing linear presentation limitations.

Findings

Enhances user productivity in notebooks

Supports complex visual analytics with sticky cells

Facilitates non-linear code organization

Abstract

How can we better organize code in computational notebooks? Notebooks have become a popular tool among data scientists, as they seamlessly weave text and code together, supporting users to rapidly iterate and document code experiments. However, it is often challenging to organize code in notebooks, partially because there is a mismatch between the linear presentation of code and the non-linear process of exploratory data analysis. We present StickyLand, a notebook extension for empowering users to freely organize their code in non-linear ways. With sticky cells that are always shown on the screen, users can quickly access their notes, instantly observe experiment results, and easily build interactive dashboards that support complex visual analytics. Case studies highlight how our tool can enhance notebook users's productivity and identify opportunities for future notebook designs. StickyLand is available at https://github.com/xiaohk/stickyland.