Database Theory + X: Database Visualization

TL;DR

This paper establishes a formal link between data modeling and visualization, demonstrating that visualization specifications can be viewed as data modeling choices, and extends visualization techniques to encompass entire databases.

Contribution

It introduces a formal framework connecting database constraints with visualization design, expanding visualization from individual datasets to entire databases.

Findings

Visualization specifications map database constraints to visual representations.

Many visualization design decisions are fundamentally data modeling choices.

Extended visualization techniques to whole databases rather than single datasets.

Abstract

We draw a connection between data modeling and visualization, namely that a visualization specification defines a mapping from database constraints to visual representations of those constraints. Using this formalism, we show how many visualization design decisions are, in fact, data modeling choices and extend data visualization from single-dataset visualizations to database visualization